


Lamplit

by spacemonster



Series: Steamstuck [1]
Category: Homestuck
Genre: Alternate Universe - Steampunk, Angst, Dehumanization, F/F, F/M, Flushed Romance | Matesprits, Gen, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Pale Romance | Moirallegiance
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-12-30
Updated: 2016-12-16
Packaged: 2017-11-22 22:24:44
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 25
Words: 127,842
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/615023
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/spacemonster/pseuds/spacemonster
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Steampunk AU. Subterranean shenanigans in a city called Darkhaven, where John Egbert is one of many charged to keep the lanterns burning. Trolls are hated and oppressed outcasts, eking out a miserable existence on the city limits. Star-crossed lovers John and Karkat do their best to cling to their friends, as their last scraps of hope are snatched away one by one.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. The Astronaut

**Author's Note:**

> Rated E for violence and sexual content.
> 
> I will include trigger warnings per chapter to the best of my ability.
> 
>  **Trigger warnings:** (for the whole work) Dehumanisation, guns, graphic violence

Welcome to LAMPLIT. Humans rule, trolls drool, and we're all afraid of the dark.

John Egbert woke with a cough.

“Gosh,” he rasped out, groping in the dark for the glass of water he left on his bedside table as habit every night. A couple of messy sips and the cough had stopped, but still he shook because he had just woken from _another_ sex dream about a troll, a troll he’d never even met but had only seen in the illustrations of cautionary tales, because good upstanding people didn’t visit the outskirts of Darkhaven, and they certainly didn’t have business with the trolls living behind the razor-wired fence.

_Breathe._

Foul grey-skinned creatures of the night, depraved and hedonistic – that was what the books said. The subhuman status of the trolls was the backbone of the Lamplighter code of practice; in fact, it was in his own handwriting, faithfully copied and pinned above his bed. John Egbert was a good employee, the type who puts his head down without asking questions – but every other month or so he’d have this kind of strange experience, waking to his own surprised coughs because he’d caught his breath because, because, because…

_Count to ten. Don’t shake. Get a grip._

They were never bad dreams, though. They were the kind where you wake up and want to fall back asleep again so desperately that you’re mashing your face into your pillow because of some stupid fuzzy feeling – because the love of your life is trapped somewhere between your temples, and you can never meet them, and real life is such a downer, isn’t it?

Begrudgingly, John pushed himself to his feet, made his bed (after all, making your bed is the first step to a productive day!) and glanced briefly to his bedside clock. It was four-thirty or so in the morning; it was a Friday; everybody loves 5AM shifts.

John padded across his room, and tugged open the curtains. Slats of incandescent amber lamplight spilled through the gap, pouring over him and catching dust floating in the space between him and the glass. His apartment was on the uppermost floor of a grim tower block, a huge decaying molar in Darkhaven’s gaping maw. He lived so high up that he could even see the city ceiling, a massive arc of rock peppered with stalactites and their inlaid crystals glowing dimly in the lowlight.

The city, a living animal, sprawled out generously beneath him: a jumble of neighbourhoods, some slicked with a coat of industrial grease, others glowing just a little brighter with that honey-warm light, some accented with floating gardens and baroque marble façades… further out, where the Lamplighters rarely ventured, was the Lower City. Troll territory. And beyond that, blackness, so that the city seemed like a covert curtained stage. That way was suicide, a clear path to never being heard from again. People disappeared – the dark can do strange things.

That was what the Lamplighters were for, of course, the only standing bastion against the dark. For a subterranean civilisation, Darkhaven loathed the darkness, so much so that an entire faction existed to keep the wicks burning. John was one of them, a junior – he’d been in the position for two months, which meant he usually got handed the hated graveyard shifts. He’d always thought there was something romantic about it, being the guardian of a civilisation, a light-bringer, but somehow he found that his life wasn’t so beautiful as he’d imagined it would be as a kid.

Today was John’s twentieth birthday – not that it really mattered – so he felt particularly introspective. Time seemed to move so slowly, but every year came the faithful jarring reminder that he hadn’t amounted to much. Despite being, to all appearances, completely in control of everything, John was quite sure he was being suffocated. Even now he was annoying himself, spending ten minutes standing at his bedroom window mulling over pointless exposition. His life was boring.

He knew his life was boring because he had his three closest friends, who he’d known since they were all children, to compare himself to. They certainly didn’t find themselves awake this early in the morning smoothing the lapels on their military jackets and tying their bootlaces in standard conformation, as he did. If any of them were awake, it was probably Rose, having stayed up all night with a book – one of her teenage habits. John had long since forgotten the point of reading.

With an enormous, chest-rocking sigh, John eyed himself in the mirror on his closet door. His looks didn’t matter that much to him – he’d given up on romance as a practical possibility, for one thing – but he liked to look respectable for his job. And it wasn’t like he was _bad_ looking, with his dark olive tan and just-about-tameable crop of floppy black spikes. He met his own eyes through his glasses frames; bright blue, unapologetically unusual, and always expressing something, but never the right thing. His poker face was well-practiced by now.

The Lamplighters’ strict diet and exercise regime kept him trim and muscular enough, but he never really had his heart in it, so even though he was broad-shouldered and his arms swollen with strength, there was no washboard stomach under his uniform. He always felt like he should’ve been trying harder.

Laced and buttoned, with the grogginess booted out of him by a cup of strong coffee and the sleep rubbed from his eyes, John made for his apartment door, only to spot a letter lying on his doormat.

_ yo_

_happy birthday, bro._

_meet me outside city hall nine oclock tonight. bring me your bullshit excuses in person. and if you think youre gonna blow me off like you did last year then check yourself. you wont like me when im angry._

_hug bumps  
dave_

_ps. were all coming down just for you so dont make me look like an asshole this year yeah? _

John had a strong suspicion that Dave pitied him – and that was probably fair. Dave was the coolest guy John had ever met, hands-down. He could get away with wearing sunglasses ironically in a city that’s dim-lit at best. (In fact, hardly anyone even knew or remembered the sun). He was kind of a Bohemian, a “rap artist” – rap was some ancient human thing, although from what John had heard it was still very much alive in the Lower City. And Dave spent a lot of his time in the Lower City. A _lot_. John was a city official, Dave was an outcast, they weren’t really supposed to be “bros”. Actually, it kind of put his job on the line. He’d already had one too many memos from his boss about the suspicious man in the red velvet jacket, but John couldn’t turn him down tonight, for the second year in a row that Dave had made plans just for him.

He’d just have to be careful. Thankfully for John Egbert, _careful_ was a way of life.

* * *

Even on the streets, a little further from the city ceiling, John felt stifled somehow. It wasn’t that the city was a bad place to be – no, it was beautiful. On either side of him, elegant buildings were packed in tight like pastries in a gift box, designed to replicate now anachronistic Victorian architecture, all heavy brick and intricate detail, with belts of cast iron and steel to mirror the industrial character of the city. This early, few people were around; he could hear only what sounded like a stray cat rummaging through some trash, and the steady hum and flicker of the ethereal alchemical lamps that burned overhead. There was a lamp at the end of the street that had gone out, allowing a circle of darkening haze to creep over the street corner. Sinister shadows danced over the surface of the nearest building. The dark always put his teeth on edge, even here where he knew he was safe.

Just as he drew up to the lamp there was a sudden clang behind him and his heart jumped into his throat – he told himself to calm down, that it was just a trashcan lid falling – and then he looked over his shoulder to see somebody dart across the road. His eyes widened as white-hot fear took his belly, and he pushed his back up against the wall of a building, keeping his gaze fixed on the alley that the person had disappeared into. He tried to pull himself together. He was an official.

“Hello?” he called out. “Do you need help?”

This was met with a hoarse bark of laughter.

“I’m friendly,” he offered.

Again, the bitter laugh. Angry, even. John’s hand flicked instinctively to the revolver holstered at his hip.

“If you’re friendly then you won’t need to use that gun, assbucket,” crackled back a voice.

_Assbucket?_

He squinted. Now he could just see that someone had poked their head out of the alley, to peer at him. From this distance their facial expression was inscrutable, but it couldn’t have been very kind. After all they’d just called him an assbucket. Whatever that was. He let his hand drop back to his side and stepped away from the wall, keeping his eyes fixed on the stranger.

He looked awfully ill, even under the warm, merry light. In fact he was practically grey… he _was_ grey.

“What are you doing here?” John spat out, flabbergasted, pushing his glasses up his nose. He was tempted to exaggeratedly clean them, just to make sure he wasn’t seeing things.

“Just a little exploration, _not_ that it’s any of your business. You humans are all so self-important.” the troll snickered back, a vicious grin spreading over his face.

“Excuse me, but I am a Lamplighter, and you’re being… very rude,” John said, and he felt the heat rushing to his cheeks before the troll could even retort.

“A Lamplighter? Well, you should have said sooner. How dare I even rummage through the garbage in front of you, a God amongst men,” the troll drawled. “Pity me, sir. I’m just a stupid troll who doesn’t know any better.”

He’d never met a troll before. Trolls as a rule did not venture out of the Lower City. They weren’t welcome. Technically John should have been hounding this one out of the neighbourhood, or to the Bastille for interrogation and further punishment, but he hadn’t been expecting quite so much… sass. Or intellect, for that matter. His understanding was that trolls were some subhuman race, and John had always viewed Dave’s fondness for them as a strange little quirk, something that he would never get.

But this one was incendiary.

“I think you do know better,” John said, as he started at a slow pace down the road, towards the alley. The troll wasn’t moving, just watching him, like a rabbit frozen in fear in front of an approaching fox. Or maybe the roles were reversed. John could feel nervous heat creeping up his neck. He was no predator.

“Oh, I do. You fuckheads nearly killed my friend. Poor bastard. I had to sew his insides back in, you know. But you don’t scare me, John.”

“How do you know my name?” John said back, ignoring the fact that his voice had become oddly high-pitched. 

The troll laughed, incredulous but not sarcastic, and it was impish and oddly cute. “It’s on your jacket, moron.”

“You can read that from there?”

The troll just grinned back at him. John could barely make out any details of his face, and there he was reading his ID label from 20 yards.

“Listen, I’m not going to hurt you, but you really shouldn’t be here,” John said, and then bit his lip. This was so dangerous, for the both of them. John didn’t need to be known as a troll sympathiser. He’d be run out of town – and then what? He was too soft to make it as an outcast.

“Why don’t you just turn around, go and light your lamp, and fuck off out of here? Oh, wait, I get it,” the troll said, and then took a sharp breath so that he could continue his tirade. “You’ve never seen a troll before, have you? Well, John, I’ve seen plenty of humans. You’re all as ugly as the next and I sure as hell don’t need to see another one up close.”

“What’s your name?” John said, ignoring this.

The troll snorted. John was close enough now to note that he had a tiny, nubby pair of horns sticking out from his mess of poufy black hair. He was certainly not as threatening as he acted.

“What’s it to you?”

“You know mine.”

“Yeah, and you’re holding a fucking gun, so I’d say you already have enough power over me, thanks.”

John glanced briefly at his gun again. The troll had a point.

“Okay, I get that you think I’m the enemy and everything, but I’m really not going to shoot you,” he said, but the troll just shook his head. His lip curled like another angry outburst was coming, but John had a sudden idea. “Do you know Dave?”

The big yellowy eyes that were staring back at him suddenly glittered with what John could only describe as conspiracy.

“Human Dave with the ridiculous glasses? Of course. And if you’re John who knows human Dave, then you must be human Dave’s John. Is it true that you threw away what could have been an exciting life to become a shit-eating Lamplighter who doesn’t read, drink, or masturbate?”

“Uh, um, well –”

“Wow, I really am stupid. I should have figured that out sooner,” the troll said, and his expression seemed to soften just a tiny bit, so that he was just mocking rather than openly aggressive. “You’re probably the only one of your kind who wouldn’t blast my kneecaps to splinters for being in the wrong neighbourhood. Alright, fuckass, I guess you can have my name.”

By now, John was level with the alleyway, and he and the troll were face-to-face. It was weird, seeing one in person. They looked human enough, save for the grey skin that had an almost amphibian sheen to it – not enough to be wet to the touch, he thought, but just to glisten a little. This one’s eyes were round and yellow, like something terrifying blinking out of the darkness, with bright red irises. But he was, categorically, not scary. He couldn’t have been taller than five foot five, although he was stocky enough as well as bristly and mean-looking, with his fanged scowl and furrowed brow. John was fascinated.

“Karkat.”

“Nice to meet you, Karkat.”

“Spare me the pleasantries you smug dickweed. Don’t start thinking you’re a good guy or that we’re friends. Here’s some news for you, John –”

“We’re not friends and you don’t like me?”

“Precisely! Looks like you have brains, unlike most humans. What a thrilling development.”

“That’s sad ‘cause you seem pretty funny,” John said, earnest to a fault.

“Ugh, stop, you’re going to make me throw up. Is this your new way of getting me to piss off? Being _nice?_ Because all you’re doing is making me sick.”

“Don’t trolls say nice things to each other?” John wondered, and then felt embarrassed that there was this whole secret culture he had dismissed.

“Of course, but we don’t go around acting like the sun shines out of our neighbour’s asshole –”

Someone fired a gun into the air. The shot rang out, painfully, blisteringly loud in the silence, making John wince and Karkat jump, eyes bugging.

“Oh fuck, gotta run, nice talking to you, fuckass,” Karkat said, and then disappeared into the relative darkness of the alley. John started after him but was distracted by the footsteps that were pounding closer – he turned and was confronted by the sight of his cousin, Jane. She was basically a paler version of himself – paler now, with shock.

“Did – he – hurt – you?” Jane panted, one hand on her knee, the other shaking and clutching her gun. “I was gonna – aim for – his head but – you were too close together –”

“Yeah – yeah, I’m fine, thank you, wow,” John said, still dazed by the whole thing and the slight ringing in his ear. He held Jane up by her shoulders and got a grateful smile in return as she holstered her gun.

“Gosh-darned trolls – they know they don’t – belong here,” she said, chest still heaving. She was shaking with adrenaline, which scared John a little. “I mean, I hate to hurt them, but...”

“Yeah… they don’t know what’s good for them,” John said, and they laughed it off. “Listen, uhh, the lamp at the end of the street… I should move on to the next neighbourhood, see if I can follow his trail, he can’t have gone far yet.”

“Sure, I’ll get the lamp. Maybe I’ll catch up with you later.”

John nodded.

“Thanks again, Jane,” he said, trying to sound as sincere as possible.

“It was nothing,” Jane said back, but John knew that was a lie. She nodded to him, and he watched her walk to the end of the street – she turned, they waved to each other, and then John turned on his heel and walked away. Jane had a more moderate attitude to the trolls than most, but she was ruthlessly efficient at her job. John only knew a little about her, but he did know that she had served for the Lamplighters since she was sixteen years old, around when her other friends had disappeared from the radar entirely to pursue a life of crime – at least, those were the rumours. In that way, she reminded John a lot of himself. She was always sweet to him, but there was something about her that John had never been able to pin down. And what of rude, mean Karkat? John had never been so spellbound in his life.

* * *

“Rough day?”

“I guess you could say that,” John replied as he stepped under the amber halo of the streetlight Dave leaned against, hands in his pockets, skinny elbows jutting. Dave was so effortlessly casual and handsome, it had used to drive John mad with jealousy.

“I heard you met Karkat,” Dave said, straightening up and adjusting his bowtie with an idle hand. His face was totally impassive like usual, but John could just tell somehow that he was laughing inside.

“He… well, I don’t know what to say. What’s an assbucket, anyway?”

Dave shrugged, which made John laugh – he hadn’t really had a chance to laugh about the whole encounter all day, between lighting lamps and jumping at noises behind him that might’ve been trolls. It was just so hilariously unlikely, like fate had played a hand.

“That’s just his sparkling personality,” Dave said, pushing his hand through his crest of honey-blond hair. “You’re dressed like a tool.”

“Yeah, I know, I didn’t have time to do anything about it –”

“You don’t look ready to party,” Dave said, and if he ever betrayed any emotion, maybe he would’ve sounded sad.

“I’m sorry –”

“Woah,” Dave said, staring at John’s holster and throwing up his hands in mock astonishment. “You’re packing heat. They’re gonna love that.”

“Oh, where are we going, anyway?”

Dave stared at him for a long moment. John was getting increasingly uncomfortable.

“The Living Room, troll place. It’s classy, John. Only the finest shit for my best bro’s birthday.”

“Dave, you know I can’t – not in uniform and everything –”

“Nobody’s gonna know,” Dave drawled. “Listen, I planned a whole sweet sixteen type deal for you, and you’re not standing me up this year.”

John prayed internally for strength. Evenings with Dave were usually strange enough, but this was going to be one to remember... or repress.


	2. Learn To Dance

**Notes for the Chapter:**

>  **Trigger warnings:** Guns, threatened gun violence

Unlike John, Dave spent very little of his time beating the Upper City streets, preferring to pass his hours in troll neighbourhoods. Although this meant that Dave was near enough lost in the city proper, he knew the quickest route back to the Lower City, with the lowest chance of getting caught, from any part of town. They were passing through alleyways now, John’s booted footfalls landing clunkily and splashing in puddles. Most of the wall lamps down these passages had fizzled out; they were rarely tended to as these parts didn’t fall along regular patrol routes. This of course set off John’s instinctual need for light, and he found himself turning his lighter over and over in his pocket, getting increasingly nervous as they ventured nearer the outskirts of town.

The very fringes of Darkhaven, just before the barrier bounding the Lower City, were made up of a district called the Brume for the thick smog that choked it. It was Darkhaven’s industrial belt, and the great concrete buildings were slathered in a slick patina of foul oil. Runoff and waste from factories seeped down the streets, which were a great visceral tangle, like the gut of some stanching, writhing beast. The wavering lamplight barely penetrated the haze, and so they could walk quite freely down the main roads without fear of being recognised. John felt the familiar dread setting in, as he ever did when surrounded by darkness for so long; he often had to light lamps in this district, and it was never easy. Dave was more accustomed to it, although John had to wonder how he could see at all wearing such dark glasses.

The pair of them didn’t make conversation, not needing to draw more attention to themselves than they were already – Dave in his characteristic red velvet jacket and John still wearing his Lamplighter uniform. The streets were relatively empty this late, for the factories had long since closed for the evening, and so it was all blessed quiet, relief from the usual cacophony. 

Soon enough they faced the Upper City boundary, an enormous wall made of sheets of corrugated iron, factory scraps and razor wire, and a jumble of wood pieces and bent nails. Hastily constructed, but good enough to do the job, the wall ensconced the whole of the Brume and anyone who knew their place knew better than to cross it. John had never ventured this far before. It was so obviously off-limits that they’d never even been instructed to stay away – fear and loathing of trolls was a cornerstone of society. It was perhaps the single thread uniting the people of Darkhaven: rich or poor, everybody feared what went on beyond the boundary fence.

“Suddenly I feel like this isn’t such a good idea,” John said, as they drew up to a gap in the fence. His voice was hoarse.

“We’re gonna have a good night,” Dave said, which was little reassurance, before edging himself through the gap in the fence, careful not to catch his outfit on the nails.

John shifted his weight uneasily, biting his lip. This wasn’t safe, and although calculated risk-taking was a part of his job, this seemed a step too far. Then again, there was a chance he might meet that Karkat troll again… and he’d have a chance to apologise for Jane shooting at him. That was at least the civil thing to do.

Now Dave poked his head out from through the gap, a quirked eyebrow just visible under his flop of blond hair.

“John. It’s your birthday.”

Sighing wearily, and with a last glance over his shoulder just to check that his boss hadn’t sniffed him out by now, John followed Dave through the gap in the fence, into the Lower City.

“Woah.”

They were standing at the top of a hill that gradually sloped down, so that from here they could see the whole of the troll part of town, a gorgeous multi-coloured tapestry draped below them. The trolls had light too: strings of lanterns in bright jewel shades, hanging between windows and the tops of buildings, casting an enticing glow. John was unfamiliar with the architecture – cast-iron panelled walls, accented with dark wood, and contrasted by the warm yellow light pouring out of windowframes. The emerald green copper roofing completed the treasure-like quality of the place, all sparkling and alive with light. A few chimneys were pouring out thick streams of smoke, and several buildings were interconnected with complicated networks of piping high above the streets – he had been stupid to think that trolls lacked industry, culture, humanity.

Despite all its decadence, there was something so comfortably unpretentious and inviting about it that John cast at least a few of his apprehensions aside.

“What do you think?” Dave said, and as he turned to face John, a little ruby-red light caught on his dark glasses.

“It’s amazing,” was all John could think to say.

Then, he noticed a figure at the bottom of the hill. She, a troll, waved up at them, and Dave raised a single hand in response. Before John could ask who she was, Dave had started down the hill, and John followed behind, making a mental note to stay as close to Dave as possible – trolls vilified humans just as much as humans despised trolls, and as beautiful as this place was, it wasn’t necessarily safe.

“John, this is Aradia. Aradia, John,” Dave said, and Aradia tossed her long mane of dark curls. She was stunningly beautiful, with moony eyes framed by red-tinted lashes. She had Karkat’s bright red irises, and a set of curved ram-like horns.

She shook his hand delicately, a polite smile curving her scarlet lips.

“What a pleasure. You’re a Lamplighter, I see… now I feel underdressed!” she said, still smiling at him. John’s glasses slipped down a little. Was she joking? She was wearing a black, long-sleeved dress that clung to every curve and stopped just past her knee, with lace panelling so that he could see the increasingly familiar glisten of that entrancingly alien grey skin at her waist and collarbones.

“You are beautiful,” John astutely observed, and Dave facepalmed.

“I like you already,” Aradia said with an askance smirk to Dave. “Sweet John, I’m sure you’ll understand – I didn’t have time to get changed after work.”

“What do you do?” John asked, wondering which line of work required someone to look so appallingly attractive.

“They call us demimondaines,” she said, and then upon John’s blank look, she added, “I make dirty money from human men, who seem to have… a taste for our sort.”

“Wait, you – with _humans?_ ”

“Yes. I even had a fling with your boss, you know, but that’s a story for another time…” she said, and then trailed off into a charming giggle. John boggled at her.

Then Dave firmly took John around the shoulders with one arm.

“Shall we?” he said, and the three of them headed into the Lower City.

By this hour, John was accustomed to the city falling quiet as its denizens fell asleep – but trolls either ran on a different schedule or they just never slept, because the din here was comparable to factory hours in the Brume. Music poured out of open windows, a bizarre medley of jazz and minimalist and orchestral; the streets were still alive with trolls going about their business in lively conversation, laughing or arguing and quite commonly embracing; they passed nightclubs with garish neon signs whose noise was muffled but appreciable.

Suddenly on the street corner a figure dropped out of nowhere, as though someone had thrown themselves out of a first story window. She was another troll of course, wearing a pair of brass goggles with red lenses and an enormous, toothed, and rather unsettling smile. She flared her nostrils, leaning into them, as though to scent them, and then took a step closer to John.

“Another human? How exciting,” she snickered, and then held out her palm. “Your lighter?”

“Terezi, what are you doing here?” Aradia said, tilting her beautiful head. John tried to ignore her, now recoiling slightly from Terezi and her terrifying grin.

“The others are at the bar. All the lanterns down this street went out, and my lighter’s out of fluid,” she said. John took his lighter and pressed it into her hand. “Thank you… who, exactly, are you?”

“Oh, uh, John. Lamplighter.”

“Yes, yes, you’d have to be to have one of these,” she said, flicking his lighter so that the bright green flame popped into sudden life. Their lighters were enhanced with alchemy so that they would never run dry. “One moment.”

With astonishing grace, Terezi shinnied up the nearest drainpipe and then extended her arm to light the last extinguished lantern, one that hung from an iron bracket above what looked like a store.

“She lost her sight,” Aradia said. “Try not to be disconcerted by her. She likes to… investigate.”

Now the lantern glowed with familiar alchemical light, tinted red by the coloured glass. Terezi dropped back down to earth and handed John back his lighter.

“Normally I would keep it, but…” she said, and then looked at Dave, smirking. “We’re friends now.”

“Anyway, let’s go on. We’re close, and I would be grateful to sit down, wouldn’t you?” Aradia said, smiling warmly at John. She was the least terrifying of the trolls he’d met so far, he thought. Behind them, Terezi had taken Dave’s arm.

“I heard that you met Karkat, in the city?” Aradia said.

“Um, yes,” John managed, then pressed his lips together at the memory.

“You must have a lot of patience, to have held off of shooting him,” she said, and John laughed. “He’s not all as hateful as he seems – as difficult as that might be to believe.”

They went on, Aradia keeping the polite conversation alive. She was so very charming.

“Here we are,” she said eventually, stopping beside a building whose sign read _The Living Room_ in garish scarlet neon. The large front windows were blocked by bright swathes of patterned fabric. Dave knocked thrice on the nondescript door, and someone slid open a little slat at eye-level.

“Oh, it’s about time you showed up! Hi, John! Come in, we’re all waiting,” chirped a familiar voice, and then the door swung open to reveal Jade, wearing her characteristic black hooded dress, and the smile that almost never left her face.

Jade was really cute, which was more or less irrefutable fact. Her skin was warm mocha and peppered with freckles; her eyes were _huge_ and maple green. She was short, and round, all curves without a corner on her, something like a puppy, even with the dog ears to match. Those fluffy white triangles were pricked and attentive, and just below and to the side of them she had a pair of troll-like horns, nubby like Karkat’s. Jade had been an alchemist offering bodily alterations to humans wishing to adopt a troll aesthetic, until her lab in the Upper City had been destroyed and she was outcast. She was still one of John’s best friends, the light of his life, despite her shunned behaviour.

He, Dave, Terezi and Aradia piled inside and followed Jade down a steep and narrow staircase. This place was surprisingly quiet for a troll club – from the ones they’d walked past so far, John had been expecting it to be booming inside, but the place seemed dead.

At the bottom of the staircase, they emerged into a small, dim-lit room, with rosewood-panelled walls and dark damask carpet. It smelled sweet and oddly pungent, and a little smoky. Ornate hanging lanterns provided some light, and candles burning low in their holders were clustered on a few surfaces. A bar occupied almost half of the tiny room, lined with plush red stools. The walls housed booths, which John imagined were cosy and quiet corners when the establishment was busier. As it stood at the moment, there were two people behind the bar, one that he knew and one a troll that he didn’t recognise, and a scant handful of trolls sitting at booths.

“John, happy birthday,” said Rose from behind the bar, and John grinned at her. “Take a seat, I’ll bring drinks in a moment – Kanaya, could you carry that –”

Jade broke away from their group and headed to the bar to talk to Rose. John followed Dave, Aradia and Terezi to a booth that was occupied by two trolls. One of them was in a wheelchair, positioned at the end of the table, and had horns that almost tripled the width of his head. The other was a woman, with a robotic arm that John immediately noticed because she was pointing her accusing metallic finger right at him.

“EVERYBODY, HE HAS A GUN,” she bellowed, causing the few trolls in the room to snap their heads in John’s direction. The atmosphere suddenly rocketed into one of panic. Dave’s palm met his forehead again, and before the trolls could mobilise and leap at John, his accuser had already fled her seat, clambered over her friend in the wheelchair (at which he was impressively nonplussed), and snatched John’s gun right out of its holster. Just as quickly as the atmosphere had risen, it relaxed again, but all eyes were still trained on John – most of them, amused.

The troll swung out the cylinder of his gun, adjusting her glasses as she inspected it.

“Just one round? Let’s play Russian roulette,” she said, with a sick grin. John had never heard of that before, but he could feel a cold sweat prickling the back of his neck – she was armed, and he was in an unfamiliar part of town surrounded by trolls that were indifferent to him at best.

“Um – what is Russia?” said the troll in the wheelchair, which John would have found funny if he wasn’t about to faint in terror.

“Shut up, Tavros,” she snapped, clicking the cylinder back and spinning it. Then she placed the cool metal of the muzzle against John’s forehead. His revolver held six rounds. He was too petrified to move.

Suddenly the door slammed, followed by a voice that was just as loud – “Vriska, for the _love_ of _fuck_ , what are you doing?”

It was a voice that was very familiar.

“Just playing a friendly game with our guest,” she said back smoothly, but all the same she lowered the gun. She flicked out the cylinder again, removed the bullet, and pocketed it, before handing the revolver back to John. Trying to suppress his shaking, John re-holstered it.

“Are you fucking insane? Don’t even answer that. In case you forgot, this is the guy who wouldn’t shoot me, not even at point blank range, so could we maybe extend him an ounce of hospi-fucking-tality?” Karkat frothed furiously. “And it’s his birthday,” he snapped as an addition.

“My mistake,” Vriska said smoothly, still training her eyes on John. Now he noticed that one of her eyes had seven pupils – the other, one. All eight were surrounded by sapphire-bright irises.

Karkat bristled over to them and took a seat next to Aradia, filling up that side of the booth. Vriska, too, returned to her seat, and much to his terror, John took the only seat he could – next to her. Karkat looked like a volcano about to boil over with rage, a look that John was quickly realising was normal on him, but then another troll approached, easing the tension a little.

He was dressed exquisitely, which reminded John of Aradia, but a little more eclectic. His pants were striped black and blue, and he wore a black silk waistcoat over his expensive-looking black shirt, as well as a long blue scarf. He’d dyed a purple highlight in the front of his hair, a sharp contrast to his crooked orange horns. He was staring at John through thick-rimmed glasses, and eventually he extended a heavily-ringed hand, which John took.

“Eridan,” he said, “An’ you’re John?”

John nodded, and with a swish of his scarf, Eridan took a seat next to him.

“Don’t get too cosy there, _Eridan_ ,” Karkat spat, and Eridan withdrew his arm from where he’d been about to drape it around John’s shoulder.

“I don’t know what you’re talkin’ about, Kar,” Eridan replied levelly, cocking his head with a little smirk. John watched this in apprehension. Beside him, Vriska was chuckling.

“I’m saying keep your hands off him. I’m sick of all the redrom flying around. It makes me ill,” Karkat replied.

“Really? Sure you don’t want him for yourself?”

Aradia and Vriska caught each other’s eyes across the table and both collapsed into quiet laughter.

“If it means that you’ll keep your dirty hands off him, then sure, I’ll take him,” Karkat snapped back, and John stared blankly at him.

“I admit, Egbert is a fine piece of ass, but I have important news,” Dave declared. “Drinks are here.” John slumped back in his seat, defeated. Jade set a tray down on the table and then slid into the booth to sit down next to Eridan. John was more than grateful for her company. He still felt intimidated, and now kind of stupid because he had almost nothing to say, and was probably the most boring person in the room.

Kanaya, who John recognised after a second as Rose’s girlfriend, had set down a tray of drinks in Tavros’ lap.

“Sorry to use you as a table,” she said softly, but Tavros just shrugged.

Beside her, Rose had drawn up a couple of stools, and was now setting a table with more alcohol than John had ever seen in his life – and he’d been to seedy bars with Dave, so that was _a lot_.

“We’re missing five?” Aradia said, casting her gaze up and down the table. Rose and Kanaya were now perched on barstools on either side of Tavros – it was lucky that those five trolls were missing, because they were quickly running out of space.

“Gamzee is at home, apparently with important business. The same old ‘miracles’ bullshit,” Karkat said, and looked as though he was strongly resisting the urge to roll his eyes. “Sollux is still in my apartment, sleeping off the whole… you know,” he went on, waving his hands vaguely. John remembered what Karkat had mentioned earlier – a friend who had been gravely hurt. He frowned.

“Nepeta and Equius are going to be late, but they’re coming, and, well, Feferi’s always busy. She said she would drop by, though,” Vriska said.

“Poor John,” Aradia said, with a little laugh. Suddenly all eyes were on him. “This is a lot of new people.”

Eridan pushed a reservoir glass of something milky-white towards him.

“We’re all friends here,” he said, but there was something conspiratorial in his smirk and glinting eyes.

John half-wanted to stutter out something like _uh, um, actually, I don’t really, I mean, I don’t usually drink_ , but instead he took the glass. Dave raised his eyebrows.

“Not to sound stupid,” he said, staring at its contents, “but what is this?”

“Absinthe,” Rose answered, watching him with a small, curious smile.

“Expertly prepared, of course,” added Kanaya, catching her matesprit’s eye over Tavros’ horns. He blushed in between them.

John had never drunk anything alcoholic in his life. He’d never even _heard_ of absinthe. Pushing dangerous substances on new friends was apparently a troll custom: the rest of them were waiting for him to drink first; Karkat was irritably running his thumb over the rim of his beer bottle, eyeing John carefully. Quiet fell.

John didn’t know how to drink absinthe, which was a fact that became frighteningly apparent when he lifted the glass to his lips and drank the creamy-coloured liquid in three gulps. He almost choked on the first out of surprise – it tasted like bad medicine. He slammed his glass back down on the table.

“That was gross!” he croaked, and there was silence for a second. The trolls looked at each other as if for guidance, and then Aradia lifted her wine glass, rescuing him. They all toasted John Egbert, the pussy who couldn’t hold his drink – but now rather than apprehension and hostility, he was treated with near-affection. Lively conversation took over once again, but this time, everyone seemed to want to talk to him.


	3. Rescued

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Happy new year, everyone! :)

Before long, their little group had dispersed through the room, but the conversation weaved between clusters of people, a merry ribbon whose speed and extravagance picked up as it become more tempered with alcohol. John found himself sat at the bar with a thorny Karkat, who sucked at his beer between stilted conversation. The rest of the trolls had been pleasant enough, even Vriska, after their – ‘little misunderstanding’, she’d called it – had been straightened out. But John had yet to see anything in Karkat’s cattish, heavily-ringed eyes except irritation.

“May I take your jacket, John?” Kanaya said gently from behind them. She held a brandy snifter elegantly in one hand, the other arm held across her front, and a smile that seemed almost knowing on her painted lips. Karkat didn’t even look up at her arrival, but John grinned at her.

“Sure, thanks,” he said, shrugging off the oppressive thing and handing it over.

“That thing makes you look like a tool,” Karkat sniffed, and then drained the last few drops of his beer. Kanaya gave John a little wink and then disappeared.

“I didn’t choose it,” John said back, staring at his glass and feeling just a little self-conscious again, and now exposed, too, in his black t-shirt. He ran his finger over the rim of his glass – a gin and tonic, which practically tasted like water after the absinthe.

“I know that. It’s just… self-important. I mean, all you do is light lamps,” Karkat said, and then shuffled over a stool so that he was sat next to John. Grinning abashedly, John took a sip of his drink. “Oh, and shoot at us.”

At that, John accidentally inhaled a little of his gin; he spluttered and, snickering, Karkat slapped his back until John’s coughing had subsided. Mercifully, nobody else had noticed.

After wiping his mouth, John said, “I wanted to apologise for that, actually.”

“For what? Not shooting me in the head when you could’ve?”

“No! I mean, for the girl who tried to shoot you. I – I feel like she would’ve let you go, if you weren’t with me. I think she thought I was in trouble,” John said, and then sighed. He was starting to feel just a little woozy, but not enough to make this situation any less awkward. It didn’t help that he was torn anyway, because any good Lamplighter would only apologise for failing to maim or murder a troll… and yet. Karkat was an ass, but not the kind of guy John would ever want to kill.

“It was my stupid fault anyway,” Karkat said, shrugging as John finished his drink. “I think I was just lucky that you found me before she did.”

“What were you doing there, anyway?”

It must’ve been something important – otherwise it didn’t make sense. It was too dangerous to risk it for anything that wasn’t vital. Karkat was just smirking at him, revealing a couple of his sickle-sharp teeth.

“That's none of your god-damn business,” was Karkat’s reply.

“That means it was something really embarrassing, right?” John said, grinning right back at him. Karkat snorted.

“Yes. You want another drink?”

* * *

Karkat sure had gotten him good and drunk. He couldn’t feel his tongue any more, but Vriska had assured him that this was a sign he was having a good time. It felt kind of like his head was swimming. He couldn’t quite hold his glass, either, so he’d set it down next to him on a booth table, which he was leaning against. In the corner of the very same booth, Terezi and Dave were entwined, both drunk on wine and tenderness, so that their strange and off-putting exteriors had softened a little.

Karkat was still at the bar, laughing with Rose and Kanaya; every so often John was sure they’d throw a glance in his direction. Were they talking about him? He had half a mind to go over and find out, but he wasn’t too sure if his feet could support his weight.

Unnoticed up until that moment, Eridan appeared next to John. He – or some other enthusiastic troll – had unbuttoned his waistcoat and the top few buttons of his shirt, so John could see his collarbones. He held the stem of a wine glass in his fingers, which he lifted slightly to John.

“Has somebody been drinkin’ a bit too much?” he said, his voice low and smooth. With a little guilty smile, John nodded, and then looked up at Eridan from under his eyelashes. It was funny, John decided, that Eridan looked so svelte and well-put-together, and then Karkat was a big scruff in his hoodie and his scuffed boots.

“Ain’t that cute,” Eridan said, still smirking patiently at John even though he was now bubbling with quiet laughter at the fact that Karkat had hair that didn’t lie flat. “Listen, John…”

John snapped back to attention, meeting Eridan’s eyes over the rim of his wine glass. They were purple, rich and deep, which suited him perfectly.

“I don’t usually go for you human types, except for when I gotta. But I was wonderin’ if you wanted to… y’know… get it together,” Eridan said, and at some point he leaned in close and was speaking into John’s ear, which was confusing and lovely and mostly, actually, kind of weird.

“Wha’d’you mean, ‘gotta’?” was what John eventually decided to say, and Eridan leaned away from him again, nonchalantly taking a sip of his wine as though this were all perfectly normal.

“Well, there’s not a lotta money in it, round here.”

“Not a lot of money in what?” John said, blinking huge and confused eyes up at Eridan.

“Sex. I thought it was obvious,” Eridan replied, looking just about on the verge of laughter.

“Wait you’re a _prostitute?_ ” John slurred, slightly louder than was socially acceptable. A few heads turned in their direction, but Eridan didn’t look concerned.

“Yes. I’m also second-in-command in this part of the city, under Feferi – not _literally_ under her, which is a damned shame – but that gets boring,” Eridan said, and then winked at him.

“But – Aradia?”

“Let’s just say, all of us, we’re not that rich,” Eridan sighed. “Humans go wild for a bit of troll tail. And you gotta keep the city runnin’ somehow. But anyway… my little proposal?”

John glanced over Eridan’s shoulder to look again at Karkat. He must’ve been pretty drunk by now because he was laughing – really laughing – with Rose, as Kanaya leaned between them to pour him another drink. He had so much hair that it shook when he laughed for real!

“I better not,” John said, and made a half-hearted attempt to claw at his drink. Eridan grabbed it for him and pressed it into his palm, laughing. “But you’re awful nice, and, and, handsome, you know.”

“You’re a sweetheart,” Eridan purred, and then kissed two fingertips and pressed them to John’s forehead. John blushed. Trolls were sure affectionate.

* * *

Two more trolls had arrived by now. One of them, who was wearing dark glasses like Dave’s but cracked, had been worked into a corner by Eridan and whatever Eridan was saying to him was making him sweat an awful lot. John thought that was pretty funny, so he laughed – but apart from that he wasn’t so sure what was going on anymore? There was an empty wine bottle lying next to his head and he was lying in something sticky. Maybe those two things were related. Wait was he on the floor now?

It was comfortable down there, anyway, so John decided to make no effort to move. Instead he tried looking around the room as best he could, to find the other troll he hadn’t met before.

There she was! All he could see of her was her big green trenchcoat and the long, weird blue tail hanging out of the back of it. She was leaning down and talking to Tavros, and Aradia was hovering on the edge of their conversation, too. But then the stranger turned around and she spotted him grinning up at her – much to his delight, she grinned right back, said something brief to her friends, and positively capered over to him.

“Hello! You look like you’re having a good night!” she cooed down at him, and he smiled into the carpet. “You’re John?”

He tried to speak but instead just gurgled, which he figured was probably good enough. He didn’t feel too good in his belly.

“Well it’s nice to meet you, John. I’m Nepeta. Are you okay down there?” she said, and then hunkered down beside him, watching him with an adorable little grin. He could just see her with his one eye that wasn’t pressed into the carpet.

“You are sure cute!” he managed, and she covered her giggle with her hands. “But please I don’t feel great.”

“Oh, no. Well don’t you worry John, you’ll be just fine,” she said, and John twitched his head in agreement. Nepeta caught Kanaya’s eye significantly across the room, and in a second Kanaya was beside them with a dishwashing bowl, which she set down next to John.

“I’m not gonna throw up,” John informed them, as Kanaya and Nepeta gently lifted him so that he was sitting up. Then he realised that he had collapsed next to the bar. He was surrounded by a couple of fallen barstools. His eyes wouldn’t focus properly but he hoped that Karkat wasn’t looking at him right now because he was probably the only one of them that would’ve judged him.

“Of course not,” Kanaya said, and then petted his sticky-wet hair.

Eridan and the troll he didn’t know were there now, too, watching this go down from a pair of barstools.

“Who are you?” John said up at the stranger with broken sunglasses, who bared his teeth down at him. John buried his face in his hands.

“This is Equius, John… don’t mind him, he’s not a fan of strange humans,” Eridan said, and John groaned as his stomach twisted. He tried to remember that he had been having fun. He wanted to talk to Karkat again! Except this was totally Karkat’s fault.

“How are you feeling, little guy?” Nepeta said, and John frowned.

“I don’t like it. Is Karkat looking?”

“No. He’s talking to Vriska, see?” Kanaya said, after she and Nepeta had shared a laugh at his expense.

“Okay good. Make sure he doesn’t see ‘cause I’m gonna throw up now I think.”

* * *

They’d placed him in a booth, carefully propped up between Nepeta and Eridan, who were alternately petting his hair and giving him water to drink. Eridan had repeatedly insisted _he’s fine, just put more alcohol in him_ but, thankfully for John’s liver, he had been shouted down. Another new face had arrived, too – her name was Feferi, and she sat across from John now. She was wearing a lot of colours, which John thought made his face hurt, but she was beautiful apart from that.

“So you’re a Lamplighter?” she said to him, and he nodded, swelling a little with pride. “How fascinating.”

She gave Eridan a look that probably meant something important, but John sure couldn’t figure it out.

Most of the others had either fallen asleep or were too drunk to move; Rose and Kanaya had nodded off leaning against each other in a corner booth; Vriska was laid down opposite Dave and Terezi, who were still tangled together, but snoozing; Tavros’ face was pressed against a booth table, where Jade was napping; Equius and Aradia were leaning on the bar, still sipping their drinks… and Karkat was sat at the bar, head in his hands. At least Karkat wasn’t looking at him.

“Not that fascinating… all we do is light lamps,” John said, echoing Karkat’s earlier sentiment. It was pretty true, after all.

“Well that’s important, isn’t it? I think it’s noble of you, John,” Feferi said, smiling warmly at him. John just smiled right back.

“Noble? I guess that’s one word for it,” said Karkat, and his hoarse, jarring voice made John wince. “It’s late. I should get back for Sollux.”

“Wait, Karkat!” Nepeta said, “I know it’s out of your way but do you think you could…”

She tilted her head to John. Karkat looked briefly stricken, and then his lip curled into a snarl, but before he could snap back his refusal, Eridan said, “I’ll happily take him back.”

“No, I’ll do it,” Karkat immediately said, and Nepeta slipped out of the booth so that Karkat could drag John bodily away from Eridan. “Where’s his jacket?”

John felt a whole lot better than he had when he was throwing up, but it still felt kind of like he was floating. He leaned heavily on Karkat, who was more than tough enough to support his weight. Like a little mountain goat.

“Oh, crap, Kanaya took it…” Karkat remembered, and then eyed Kanaya across the room; she was out for the count. Sighing, Karkat shrugged off his hoodie and hung it around John’s shoulders; John slipped his arms into it.

“Thanks,” he said, and lurched, but he was steadied by Karkat’s vice-like grip around his shoulders.

“And you’ve lost your glasses, too. Hard to believe humans think they’re the better species” Karkat sneered down at him – it was testament to how much John was leaning over that Karkat was actually taller than him.

Feferi looked kindly, if somewhat pitifully, at John, while Nepeta and Eridan chuckled at the sight of an infuriated, ruffled Karkat, who had gone red in the ears, dragging a staggering human boy out of the bar.

* * *

They were underground. Well – they had been underground the whole time, but now they were under the underground. Wow, that was meta, or something.

John hadn’t known about the extensive sub-subterranean passageways under the streets of Darkhaven. He had assumed that everything down here was just the sewer system, but there was also an intricate web of tunnels that could take you anywhere you wanted to go, totally in secret. It was weird, looking up out of the grates as they passed underneath them, and seeing familiar parts of the city from a totally different angle.

Karkat was leading the way now, because John had just about sobered up enough to weave his own wending way through the tunnel.

“Is this how you get into the city?” John said, and was delighted when his voice echoed all through the cavern, rattling forwards for hundreds of yards. Karkat stopped suddenly so that John staggered into the back of him; Karkat whipped around, his face twisted into that oh-so-wonderfully-familiar snarl.

“Keep your voice down, fuckass. But, yes. As far as we know, your people don’t know about these passages,” he said, and then sighed and kept on walking.

“But… we built them? So we’d know that they were here?”

Karkat snickered quietly.

“You are laughing at me.”

“You’re naïve.”

“Your pants are too long.”

It was true. The cuffs were rolled up above his beaten-up, filthy boots.

“Wait, don’t get me wrong! I think it’s a good look. It’s funny ‘cause you are so tiny but also so angry.”

“Wow, John. You deserve commendations, for your ability to be a total fucking shithead,” Karkat drawled in response.

John was on the verge of an apology when there was a sudden, rumbling, terrifying growl from somewhere ahead of them. He stopped dead, eyes wide, breath catching in his throat. It was the kind of noise that a furious predator makes when it has a mawful of hot fresh meat, the kind of nightmare sound that precedes a sudden awakening in cold sweat. He could feel his stomach drop, replaced by a frozen emptiness, as his heart bounded upwards into his throat.

“The fuck was that!” John squeaked, but Karkat wasn’t even looking at him – he was still, one arm extended as if to protect him, but that wasn’t what he meant by that gesture at all because why would Karkat protect him – “Karkat!”

The sound of heavy footfalls, and something metallic, scraping, maybe razor-sharp claws nicking on the cool stone of the tunnel floor, and a panting, a _slavering_ , and still Karkat wouldn’t move, even as John tugged urgently on the back of his shirt.

It was an enormous white wolf.

“KARKAT!”

John hit the floor in half a second.

* * *

He woke with a start, and threw his arms up over his face in anticipation of the beast’s massive jaws – but nothing came. In fact there wasn’t noise at all, save for the ticking of his alarm clock. Soothing. Regular. Predictable. Not like trolls, or wolves, or alcohol.

Panting, John rolled onto his side. He could feel his heart hammering in his chest, as if it hadn’t quite yet got the memo that he was safe. And, wow, did his head ever ache, like someone had buried a hatchet deep and hard into it, cleaving his brain right down the middle.

The last thing he could remember was two rows of terrible teeth packed into a long snout, and Karkat’s big yellow eyes.

John ran his hands through his hair. Had it all just been a dream?

The realisation came slowly… he was still wearing Karkat’s hoodie.


	4. All I Need From You

**Notes for the Chapter:**

>  **Trigger warnings:** References to violence and torture, threatened gun violence, mention of suicide

_hi john!_

_karkat told me what happened last night, i am so sorry you ended up meeting bec like that!!! hes not a bad dog at all, he was just excited to see karkat again i think, seeing as we lost him for so long in the upper city. poor pup._

_i hope that he didnt put you off coming to see us again! (hehehe, am i talking about karkat or bec? who knows!)_

_anyway everyone sends their love, see you soon i hope,_   
_jade_

_Dear John,_

_It’s been a week since any of us have heard from you. Of course, I’m sure you’re busy, what with your work, but I have to say we weren’t expecting you to disappear completely._

_Nonetheless, you left your jacket here, and Dave has your glasses. Knowing you, you likely have plenty of replacements, but just in case you don’t, you know where you can find us._

_Regards,_   
_Rose_

_hey_

_i dont know what happened that made you not wanna hang out anymore_

_but we miss you, man_

_if it was karkat dont worry about him, the guy hates everyone and everything. youll get used to it. if you ever come back_

_speaking of that douche he asked me to give you a letter, he wouldnt let me read it though so proceed with caution_

_love you man,_   
_dave_

_HUMAN JOHN,_

_YOU ARE NO DOUBT AWARE THAT YOU ARE STILL IN POSSESSION OF MY JACKET. I WOULD LIKE IT BACK AS SOON AS POSSIBLE, PREFERABLY WITHOUT THE REEK OF PATHETIC HUMAN LOSER. GIVEN YOUR CONDITION, I UNDERSTAND THAT THIS MAY NOT BE POSSIBLE._

_IN CASE YOU WERE WONDERING, YES, I DID CARRY YOUR UNCONSCIOUS BODY BACK THROUGH TWO NEIGHBOURHOODS FULL OF HUMANS THAT WOULD SHOOT ME DEAD ON SIGHT. AND IN CASE YOUR SKULL IS TOO THICK FOR THE IMPLICATION TO PENETRATE, THIS MEANS THAT YOU OWE ME, HUMAN JOHN._

_IT’S JUST RUDE TO COMPLETELY FUCKING DISREGARD SOMEONE WHO RISKED THEIR LIFE TO GET YOU HOME SAFELY. THAT’S ALL I’M SAYING._

_YOURS HATEFULLY_   
_KARKAT_

John had told himself he wouldn’t read the letters, but he ended up reading them all at once, on a night about three weeks after his birthday. He sat cross-legged on his bedroom floor in his underwear under dull yellow light, surrounded by sheaves of paper and torn envelopes. There was pen and paper set by his side, but he no longer had any intention of replying – what was there to say? That he was sorry? The trouble was that he wasn’t even sure that was true. This was what he wanted, or at least it was what was easiest: to pretend the whole debacle had never happened, and to relegate it to some secret corner of his mind. Nobody had to know. He’d stuffed Karkat’s jacket into the very back of his closet, although the fact that he couldn’t bring himself to throw it out made him feel all the more insecure about his decision.

All that really mattered, though, was that the lamps didn’t go out. John wasn’t too sure who he was keeping them lit for any more. It paid the bills. John thought of Eridan and Aradia, and frowned.

In a familiar stupor, John picked himself up off the floor and padded across the room, leaving the letters in his wake. It was just past eleven o’clock by now, and he had a night shift starting in half an hour. He hadn’t even bothered to get out of bed until about an hour ago. He dressed himself slowly and groggily, pleased that the Lamplighter uniform made him look well-put-together and important even though he felt scattered. True to Rose’s estimation of him, John did indeed have a spare of everything; he tugged on his standard-issue jacket, over a black knit sweater.

The Lamplighter jacket was, he’d been told countless times, more than just a piece of clothing. To the people of Darkhaven, it was a symbol. Once, it had meant the same things to him, too: hope and dignity and strength. Now, though, it was just a jacket. A nice jacket – double-breasted and crafted from navy wool, with two rows of polished brass buttons and an embossed nameplate with his name and rank – but a jacket all the same. He slipped his bandolier over it, strapped on his belt with the gun holster and a number of utility pouches, as well as a lantern, hanging from it, and then put on his glasses.

Just before he left, he inspected himself in his closet mirror. Once upon a time, he would’ve thought that he looked professional and brave and trustworthy, but now all he saw was a tousle-haired coward with bloodshot eyes and a pitiable face. He thought of how he’d collapsed at the sight of a big white dog, and sighed. Then he thought of how Karkat had carried him home, and he rubbed between his eyebrows. It was too embarrassing.

On that defeating line of thought, he clicked shut his closet and then left, locking his apartment door quietly behind him. It was late enough that it would be rude to make unnecessary noise, but his booted feet were still slightly over-loud on the worn hardwood of the corridor. Most of his neighbours were Lamplighters, but he didn’t know anything about them apart from that – he never saw them. He went down the stairs at the end of the hall and left the building, turning up his collar and lapels. It was chilly out, and tonight a damp, suffocating fog had set in – most of the lamps would surely be choked out in these conditions.

With a swift flick of his lighter he’d lit the lantern hanging at his hip, so that it cast a comforting globe of apricot light. Tonight he was to visit a quieter part of the city, the Athenaeum, a small district devoted to the sciences that was, mercifully, not too far off.

John’s part of town was one of the poorest; whereas the regal districts had buildings of brick and stone and marble, these were of wooden planks and rusting iron shafts. The paving stones were cracked and wonky, and the cobbled roads were pockmarked with potholes and puddles of slushy effluence, one of which he’d just stamped in. The cool wetness seeped into his boot and he shook his foot irritably before taking off again, at a slightly more urgent pace.

Soon he passed through a gate with bent bars and an aged sign that read _YOU ARE NOW LEAVING THE BARRACKS. ENTERING: THE ATHENAEUM_.

Academics had little business in the Athenaeum after curfew, so by this time in the night it was silent – and dark. After a few minutes he’d left the watery light of the Barracks behind him and now the lantern at his side was all he could see by, as most of the lamps down the main road of the Athenaeum had gone out.

“Hey!” someone called out, and John jumped about a foot in the air. “Whoops – sorry, John, I didn’t mean to scare you!”

The voice was familiar – he span on his heel, to see a silhouetted, fog-shrouded figure approaching him from the direction of the distant halo of the Barracks. As he neared, the finer details of her person crystallised. It was Jane, but he didn’t relax.

“Well how about that,” she said, once she was standing at the fringes of John’s lantern glow. “How are you doing?”

“Not bad,” John lied.

“I guess you’re lighting the Athenaeum tonight, too?” Jane said, and she cocked her head, searching him with her eyes. It was weird to see her mirror his mannerisms; she was like a happier John from a better time.

“Yeah,” John said, throat cracking. He wasn’t usually reticent around Jane, not at all, but he felt the weight of his new secret burning in his chest.

“Let’s work together, then. I just want to go home!” Jane chirped, and the pair of them started down the road.

Conversation was shaky and much more awkward than usual, and John was thankful that most of their time was spent climbing up lamp posts. Each lamp they lit threw another segment of the Athenaeum into sudden relief, revealing an elegant but not pretentious, almost whimsically designed district, with marble paving stones and intricate details carved into the fronts of the buildings. They were bookshops and curio peddlers, cramped together and stacked one on the other, and then alchemist’s workshops and clockwork engineers’, interrupted by a statuesque library or academy; some of them took up entire blocks and were elegantly denoted by their beautiful facades. At one point, they passed a derelict, boarded-up place, whose last owner had slicked it with black paint that was now peeling, and all its windows were broken. John recognised it as Jade’s old residence, and winced. Jane’s gaze lingered there too, long enough for John to notice. They went on.

“I feel like I never have much of a reason to come to this part of town,” Jane remarked, after hopping down from the last rung of a lamppost. “It’s awfully pretty, isn’t it?”

“Beautiful,” John replied, as they drew up to the district square. It was a perfectly serene courtyard, featuring a wide diamond of grass – real grass, like the stuff they wrote of in ancient overground texts – peppered with willow trees heavy with tangles of ribboned branches. A fountain bubbled in the centre of the diamond lawn, where a lady carved of jade-green stone poured forth water from her bottomless pitcher.

“John, can I tell you something?” Jane said abruptly. She glanced around as if to check that they were alone, but it was abundantly obvious that their only company was the stone lady.

“Of course,” John replied, looking across at her. He wasn’t too sure if he wanted to hear this, but then again he had no real option.

“A couple of nights ago… they caught a troll.”

John’s heart leapt up and formed a knot in his throat. He immediately wanted to ask: who? Were they safe? He thought of Karkat lying dead in a gutter, a bullet wound in his head, and he felt sick.

“How?” John croaked, balling his hands into fists in his jacket pockets.

“He was sneaking around in a back-alley in the Brume when he was spotted by a standard-rank. Clever, for a troll, though. It seems that he knew that part of town pretty well because I’ve heard he almost got away, but he was clipped by an alchemical bullet,” Jane recounted, and then she grimaced. “Apparently it burned a clean hole through his knee joint.”

John was rapt with attention but his mind was elsewhere. Imagining Karkat hitting the ground with the devastating grace of a fallen beast… would he call out? Would he rant and rage at them as he always did, or would he be struck silent with the pain? And what would they do with him next? Kill him?

“Then what happened?” John managed, trying to force those awful thoughts out of his mind.

“Well, he was escorted to the Bastille, for interrogation and – torture,” Jane said, and John took note of the brief pause before Jane’s last word, daring to hope that she was safe, that she too was uncomfortable with the whole dirty business. Jane had taken her lighter out of her pocket and was absently flicking it on and off.

“Did you find out his name?” John asked, before he could help himself.

“What?” Jane said, her eyes suddenly meeting John’s, “Of course not. That’s a strange question, John, you should know better. Anyway, the story gets weirder. This all happened about a week ago, and after a week in the Bastille, you’re lucky to be alive at all. He was hurt badly, both kneecaps destroyed, all cut up and most of his fingers broken, things like that. But this morning an officer went on into his cell to check on him – and he was gone. Without a trace.”

Containing his sigh of relief, John said, “How do you suppose he got out?”

“Think about it, John. They must have friends, family. They’re getting a lot braver coming into the Upper City, you know. It almost seems like they’re working together,” Jane said, stroking her chin. She was much, much brighter than most of the Lamplighters. John, however, knew more than even the highest echelons of the Lamplighters did, and he wasn’t sure if he liked his privileged position.

Following a non-committal grunt, John said, “Maybe.”

“Yeah. It’s scary to think about, isn’t it?” Jane paused briefly, to allow John to agree. John jerked his head in an ambiguous direction. “Anyway, I think we’re about done here, so I’m gonna head back. You wanna walk?”

“I wish. My shift ends in two hours,” John said, and Jane laughed. She then gave a huge stretch and yawn, bid John goodnight, and disappeared down a side street.

John’s route tonight was a hairpin loop through half of the Brume. He continued on his way, soothed by the thought that whichever troll had found themselves bound in the Bastille was now safe. They had been lucky – impossibly lucky. The Bastille was famously impenetrable; he wondered which of the trolls could have masterminded its infiltration. They must have been a genius.

The fog remained his only companion, glistening around him in the light cast by his lantern, as he passed out of the Athenaeum and into the gulf of smoke that was the Brume. Tonight the fog mingled with the swathes of smoke, creating an unpleasant, eye-watering shroud that clung to the back of his throat. The quicker he finished, the quicker he could resurface from this reeking hellish place – and so he hurried on, stopping to relight wall-lamps and lampposts where needed. Their wavering glow could barely cut the smog, and a familiar but unpleasant coldness crept about John’s neck the longer he spent in the low light. He was not fond of the darkness.

Minutes passed and John felt sicker as he descended deeper into the Brume. It was suffocating, like being trapped under a black sea, and the silence did nothing to sate his anxiety. By the time he was half-finished, the district glowed a murky orange that was just as sinister as the soot-stained darkness that had prevailed before his arrival.

Suddenly out of an alleyway there came the sound of footsteps. John froze, eyes widening as he flicked his stare to the gap between two buildings. He cursed his lantern – he could’ve hidden, ensconced by fog, if it weren’t for its faithful light.

“Isn’t it past your bedtime?” rasped a voice that John knew only too well. Karkat emerged from the alley, stepping under the glow of a streetlight that John had just lit, and staring across at him with a dismissive frown.

“Karkat, this is dangerous,” John said lowly, before crossing the street to stand under Karkat’s streetlight.

“I’m not stupid. You heard about what they did to Gamzee?” Karkat said, eyeing John very warily. John kept his distance, hovering at the edge of the streetlight’s radiance.

“Just now, I think. You rescued him?”

“We barely made it out of there alive. It was just me and Vriska.”

“Is he… is he going to be okay?” John said tentatively, and Karkat scowled at him.

“Forgive me for not believing that you actually give a fuck,” Karkat snarled. “He will be okay. But only because he’s Gamzee and for some reason that none of us can figure out, he’s near impossible to take down. They fucked him up. Bad. And we just got done fixing Sollux. Maybe next time we won’t be able to –”

Karkat just stopped, and shook his head. John was on the verge of saying that he was sorry, when Karkat said, “Get your gun.”

“What for?”

“Just get your fucking gun!” Karkat snapped, and John did as he was told, removing his gun from his holster and holding it awkwardly in front of his chest.

Karkat took a couple of strides forward, and grabbed John by the wrist. His hand was searingly warm against John’s fog-chilled skin. John made no attempt to resist as Karkat pulled his hand closer to his head.

“What are you doing, Karkat?” John said. To answer his question, Karkat lifted his head, so that the muzzle of John’s gun was pressed right between his eyebrows.

“For as long as you let my friends get shot at and torn apart, you’re not my friend, John,” Karkat growled. “And down here, if we’re not friends, we’re enemies.”

“I’m not –”

“Shut the fuck up. Your people fucked up my moirail so badly that he can’t even move. He hasn’t opened his eyes yet. We don’t know when he’s going to.”

Karkat pushed his forehead a little harder against John’s gun.

“Shoot me now, like you want to. You’re just as bad as the rest of them. You don’t care about us.”

“Karkat, I’m not going to shoot you,” John said, quaking, and he tried to pull his hand away but Karkat’s grip was vicelike.

“Don’t think you can lie to my fucking face, John. You’re going to fuck us over in the end, so just do it!” Karkat hissed, still fixing John with those huge yellow eyes.

“You’re scaring me, Karkat,” John said. “Please don’t try and make me do this. I don’t want to kill you.”

They stared at each other for a few long moments. Karkat’s expression was stony, unwavering; the grim staunch look of someone who had been betrayed before, and knew what was coming.

Eventually Karkat’s grip on his wrist loosened, and John quickly holstered the gun before Karkat changed his mind.

“You need to get out of here,” John said.

Karkat grunted, and turned towards the alleyway he’d appeared from.

“You know where to find us, if you decide to be a good guy,” he rasped, and left.


	5. Save Me, Too

**Notes for the Chapter:**

>  **Trigger warning:** Mention of parental death

“As you may have noticed. Trolls are increasingly slipping past. Our apparently meagre lines of defence. But they are not welcome here. And we cannot let them believe that this is a safe place for them to come.”

A sudden murmur rippled across the captivated audience; a chorus of self-satisfied ‘hear, hear’s that made John grind his teeth. They, about three hundred of them, and all Lamplighters, were seated in rows that ascended up from the great proscenium stage in the main hall of the Bastille. Behind a centre-stage podium stood John’s boss, Lord English, gesticulating forcefully as the indoctrination went on, in his trademark, stilted way.

“That is the reason. For today’s special general meeting. If our enemies are rallying against us. Then we must mobilise,” English exhorted.

Somehow John had found himself in the front row, close enough to English that he could see the sweat shining on his forehead. Lord English was a pretty horrifying-looking man, tall, pale and gaunt, with eyes that seemed to bulge. He had lost all of his hair in an alchemical accident, so much of his scalp was a thick, red net of scar tissue. All John could think of was that Aradia had slept with him. Funny that he could stand there proselytising the murder of trolls when he’d shared his bed with one.

“Last week, a troll, escaped from the Bastille. Not one of you snivelling rats could stop him. During his incarceration, he refused to divulge… information. Troll prisoners are useless to us. We will no longer show them mercy. Effective immediately.”

Total silence fell. Not a single Lamplighter coughed or shifted in their seat. Was this an order to…?

“The Lamplighters now shoot to kill. Sympathisers will be executed. By the Tribunal.”

This was wrong. This was so, so wrong. John wanted to cry out but that would be enormously stupid. He felt ill. In his peripheral vision, he could see sick grins all over his neighbours’ faces. Troll murder hadn’t exactly been frowned upon before, but taking captives had always been preferred – and now, whatever it was that had kept Gamzee from speaking, maybe loyalty, had now put his people in danger. Now they all had free reign to put down any troll they saw, sanctioned by English.

“In light of our new objective. Certain changes are necessary. Today, those who are faithful and competent. Will be rewarded. Please join me on the stage. When your name is read.”

John wasn’t stupid. This was no reward for good service. This was just bolstering their ranks to bump up their kill count.

“Logan, M. Pilbeam, N. Maple, E. Greene, A.”

A stream of junior-ranking Lamplighters made their way awkwardly down the aisles and up onto the main stage, forming a neat line and beaming as though their parents were watching. He frowned. One of them could be responsible for the next troll casualty. Again he thought of Karkat lying shot in the street, perhaps at the hands of Heane, E., or Egbert, J. –

Hang on.

Maybe there was another Egbert, James or someone, who was more popular with the Tribunal than he was – but no, no one else moved.

“John Egbert.”

Well, crap, that was definitely him. John shoved himself out of his seat and shuffled awkwardly up to the stage, turning his head for a second to stare up at the assembly of uniformed Lamplighters, which swept up above him like a spectre. But they were smiling, flashing thumbs-up at the juniors on the stage. He could hardly throw this back in his boss’ face, but this was not right.

He took his place beside Heane, E., clasped his hands behind his back, and waited.

Soon, English held out his hand to John, and John drew his gun and placed it in his palm. That gun had never been fired, and it had only gotten close twice. It seemed ludicrous that he was trading in one gun he’d never used to receive two more that were more dangerous and equally as likely to gather dust.

He holstered one revolver and attached the holster of the other to his opposite hip. They fired alchemical rounds, he knew that; he received a bandolier of them, which he strapped around his chest, and also a new name tag, which read _JOHN EGBERT, STANDARD RANK LAMPLIGHTER, CLASS II_.

Hadn’t he been praying for this day to come just over a month ago? It all seemed so wrong now.

* * *

In the cool quiet of his bedroom, John thought over the morning’s meeting, sitting cross-legged on his bed. He’d slung his bandolier and guns unceremoniously on an armchair in the corner and thrown off his jacket for good measure, too.

There was a choice to be made. Two factions were pulling him apart. Had the Lamplighters finally accepted that he might have potential? This seemed unlikely; his last monthly report had described him as “average, and occasionally inept”. John doubted he was much more to them than a pawn.

His father had dealt in supplying weapons to the Lamplighters. It had been a stressful job, not least because of English’s obsession with stockpiling an arsenal, and three years back his dad had suffered a heart attack and died. The worst part was that John had never really seen his dad smile, just suck on his pipe and plough, unfeeling, through life, keeping alive purely out of fatherly obligation. That seemed like no way to live. John wanted to live beautifully, and importantly.

What was important? He was no Bohemian like Dave. He lacked Rose’s artistry, and he certainly wasn’t like Jade, a renegade, fearless. He was just plain John, hired muscle for the Lamplighters, and a loser.

If he wanted excitement, drama, romance, he knew where to look. If he wanted to be important he knew where he could go. Somewhere under the emerald roof of the Lower City were people who could use his help. Karkat was right; he knew where to find them.

He couldn’t help but feel afraid. Troll sympathisers would be executed, they’d made that quite clear, and he didn’t know if he could handle the role of double agent. Then again, maybe the fact that he was by all appearances so utterly _average_ meant that he would suit it perfectly. And there was so much he could do to help them. There was so much that he knew. They would be safe – at least, relatively. For one thing, the trolls didn’t yet know that the Lamplighters no longer knew mercy or took captives.

It wasn’t just that he wanted to be important, though. It was also that nights in the Lower City seemed more bright, colourful, and _alive_ than the cold sterility of his bedroom on another lonely night. Between Karkat’s frothing rage and Eridan’s lascivious come-ons, he’d actually had a lot of fun on his birthday, and maybe it could happen again. Maybe they could even be… friends.

God, was he ever scared, though. It was exactly as Karkat had said when they’d first met – he had given up what could have been a thrilling life for this, whatever monotonous bore it was that he had now. And he had been comfortable. This had been the easy way out, to settle down into Lamplighter servitude.

He had to go.

* * *

Dressed in Karkat’s hoodie, a pale blue collared shirt and braces, and black jeans tucked into his boots, John just about passed for a civilian (if a gun-toting one). Maybe an engineer. He’d slung goggles around his neck for good measure, and strapped on his belt with the gun holsters. It felt very, very strange to be out and about without his Lamplighter uniform. It was like he’d left a part of his identity sitting in his apartment – a part that he felt glad to step out of, for once. He’d stashed his bandolier into his backpack, along with a few things he’d prepared to show the trolls.

That was, if they would have him. Right now he was beneath the Lower City, picking his way through the complicated tunnel system. Last time he’d been here, he had been lolling around drunk, and it was hard to dissect the memory of that night and figure out which turns he should take. Every time he passed under a grate he stopped and stared up out of it for minutes at a time, trying to figure out if it was a part of the city that he recognised. It rarely was.

This was so typical of him. Every time he made an effort to do something out of the ordinary it blew up in his face and made him wonder why he’d even bothered in the first place! But this time he wasn’t going to be a grumpy baby about it. He kept walking.

The next grate looked promising. He could see corrosively bright flashes of neon – maybe the Living Room was nearby. He scaled the rusted rungs that were set in the tunnel wall up to the grate, which he pushed open with one hand, and then hauled himself up out of. As he kicked the grate back into place in the street, he glanced around; it was quiet. According to his watch it was five in the afternoon – clearly the Lower City didn’t really come alive until late.

He took off down the street, sure that he remembered walking through this part of town. Before long he knew that his suspicion was correct, because there was the Living Room, its red sign popping against the dark wood wall like flushed lips. Trepidation crept in again, he felt unease in his belly, but all the same he walked to the entrance.

Now standing on the front step and looking wholly out of place, John rapped his knuckles on the door.

For a few moments, there was no reply. Maybe he’d come too early; maybe the trolls were all still asleep, waiting for the evening to roll around. He stood on the doorstep for a minute or two, biting his lip anxiously, before knocking again.

Suddenly the eye-level slat was pushed open, and a pair of yellow eyes with jewel-like amethyst irises stared across at him.

“Well look who it is,” said a familiar twang, and John smiled a little fearfully.

“Eridan,” John said. He wasn’t too sure how Eridan felt about him; those glistening eyes narrowed for half a second before the door clicked and swung open.

“Forgive me for pointin’ it out, but nobody’s expectin’ you, you big pile’a deserter trash,” Eridan said, looking down his nose at John.

“Who’s here?” John said, suffocating the urge to turn on his heel and go back home, following the path of least resistance.

“Hold your hoofbeasts, buddy,” Eridan said, grasping one of John’s shoulders, “You ain’t seein’ nobody until you tell me what it is you’re doin’ back here again. Karkat said you was done with us. But you’re wearin’ his jacket? What’s goin’ on?”

“I’m not done with you. I want to help you. And, look, I know you have no reason to trust me, but I have things with me that can help you and I would just really appreciate it if you would all hear me out. A lot happened today and there are things you need to know,” John said, and then quirked an eyebrow, surprised with himself. It had been a long time since he’d said as many words as that all at once.

Eridan levelled his stare, eyes narrowed to catty slits, sucking on his upper lip in consideration. Eventually he said, “Darn it, Egbert, you’re lucky you’re handsome or you’d be out on your ass right now. C’mon.”

After an embarrassed snort, John followed Eridan down the narrow staircase and into the bar proper. The first thing he saw was a mass of long white fur and a long, floppy tongue slavering all over his face.

“Bec! No! Bad dog! Gosh I’m sorry friend, he’s just so excited lately and – JOHN?” Jade flustered, and then positively sprinted across the room from her seat at the bar to haul Bec off of him by the waist. “JOHN!” she yelled in his face, and then crushed him in a hug like a bear trap, apparently not mindful of the dog saliva.

“It’s so good to see you, Jade,” he wheezed, after she let him go. Eridan rolled his eyes and took a seat at the bar. “Isn’t anybody else around?”

“It’s still early for trolls, John, most of them are sleeping! But… what are you doing here, anyway?”

“He needs to speak to us all. Could’a picked a more convenient hour, but that’s humans for you,” Eridan answered for him.

“Okay! Bec, c’mere doggy,” Jade said, and Bec came, planting his butt at her feet. Even sat down he was as tall as her waist. That dog was terrifying to look at, at first, but it quickly became apparent that he was as good-natured as his owner and creator. Bec was a miracle of alchemy, part-dog and part-who-really-knew-what, with three tails, four big yellow eyes, ram-like horns that curled around his ears and a chain around his neck. He was big enough to ride like a pony but also the cuddliest thing John had ever seen.

“We need to get everybody here, stat! Except Gamzee of course. Go round them up!”

With one happy bark, Bec lolloped away, thumping up the staircase and out of the building.

“Good dog,” John remarked, and Jade giggled.

“What’s going on down here?” floated a voice from somewhere in the back room. “Really, it would be prudent to let me know in advance of any… shenanigans.”

Rose and Kanaya emerged from a door behind the bar.

“Oh, John,” Rose said, smiling at him. “What a relief. I thought we’d never see you here again.”

“Reckons he’s on our side now,” Eridan said, “He’s got things to tell us all.”

“Things? What ‘things’? Has something happened?” Kanaya said, frowning.

“Yeah, John, what’s going on?” Jade said.

“Alright, if all you broads can just simmer down,” Eridan drawled, “He’ll explain when everyone shows up.”

Rose and Kanaya set to pulling out two booth tables and arranging them in the middle of the room, and then the rest of them helped to set stools around them. Eridan pushed John down into a stool at the head of the table, and took a seat beside him. John put his backpack down on the table. This, he realised, was going to be really, really stressful.

The first to arrive was Feferi, who sat down on the other side of John.

“So nice to have you with us again tonight, John,” she said to him, and John blushed a little, smiling. “Who else is joining us? It looks like everyone.”

“Gamzee will be missing,” Rose said, setting down drinks along the table.

“How is Gamzee?” John asked, and Rose pursed her lips.

“Better than he was a week ago.”

Next was a troll who John had yet to meet. He wore brass goggles; one lens was coloured red, the other, blue. He introduced himself as Sollux and took a seat further down the table. John noticed that he looked very pale. He of course was the one whose life Karkat had saved, and from the looks he wasn’t quite fully recovered. Jade then sat beside Sollux, patting him kindly on the shoulder.

Aradia, Vriska and Nepeta filtered through the door one after the other and sat down; Aradia and Nepeta gave John jaunty little waves while Vriska just grinned wickedly at him.

“This’ll be fun,” she said, grabbing a drink.

Soon, Equius had arrived too, and he sat opposite Aradia, looking shifty. A few moments later, Tavros wheeled through the door.

“How did you get down the stairs?” John said, staring at him.

“Oh – um – this thing – it flies –”

“Tavros used to be an engineer, before the… ah, accident. He’s very handy with vehicles,” Aradia said, smiling as Tavros drew up his wheelchair beside her stool.

Terezi and Dave then arrived, Terezi dragging Dave by the hand.

“So you’re a good guy, now, huh?” Dave said to John, as the pair of them sat down.

“I guess so,” John said back, and smirked at him.

Rose and Kanaya sat down, too, leaving one empty stool.

“Stubby’s not joining us?” Vriska said, her eyes fixed on the vacant seat, where Karkat should have been.

“Let me go, you disgusting mutt!” yelled someone in the stairway.

“Ah… speak of the devil,” she said, adjusting her glasses with a grin.

“This had better be really, _really_ fucking important! And I’m talking, if that freaky Lord English himself isn’t here on bent knee begging us for forgiveness then whichever of you blithering morons thought it was a good idea to drag me away from Gamzee is going to wish they were _never born_ –”

“Karkat, shut up and come sit,” Dave said, as Bec trotted sideways into the room, tails aquiver, dragging a furious Karkat by a slobbery arm.

“What the _fuck_ is this?!” Karkat hollered, eyes bugging as they settled on John. “Who let him in here! Eridan! You were supposed to be keeping watch –”

“Kar, shut your trap and sit down, we got talkin’ to do!” Eridan growled, slapping the table. Karkat did as he said, taking the last seat available, which was just around the corner from Eridan. He glared daggers at John, who tried to ignore him.

“Okay, everyone listen,” Feferi said, and to John’s amazement, they all did exactly that. Still, she was in charge. “This is going to be really confusing and horrible unless we all keep our mouths shut, and listen to what John has to say. So let’s do that, and save questions for the end.”

Karkat opened his mouth.

“Karkat! Keep it to yourself!” Feferi insisted, and Karkat sighed, folding his arms.

“Fine.”

“ _Thank_ you. Okay, John. We’re all ears.”

“Okay, so, um, you’re probably all wondering what I’m doing back here again,” John said, trying not to shrink under all of these pairs of eyes on him. “Well, most of you know that I’m a Lamplighter. A standard-rank Lamplighter now, actually, because I got promoted this morning. And I’m here because I… I want to help you. I can give you information from inside. Kind of like a secret agent.”

So far, nobody except Karkat looked mutinous.

“I know a lot of you probably don’t want to hear what I have to say because you don’t trust me yet, but I think I’m going to tell you anyway, then you can all make up your minds. The first thing you need to know is that as of this morning, the Lamplighters don’t take prisoners any more. Because you guys all keep being super obvious when you come into the Upper City – er, no offence – we’re cracking down. Also no troll has ever given up any useful information during interrogation, so my boss instructed that we shoot to kill.”

John tried not to look at their faces because they looked so scared and confused. The atmosphere had tightened, and he could practically feel the knotted tension radiating from Karkat.

“The good news is that you can still come into the city if you need to.”

He reached into his bag and pulled out a long, rolled-up map, which he unfurled on the table.

“The Lamplighters patrol certain routes on a specific rota.”

“So your human obsession with followin’ rules is finally useful,” Eridan quipped, followed by laughter. John grinned, and everybody relaxed.

“This map shows which routes are safe on which days. Because the lanterns can burn for up to three days at a time, every day there are a few safe routes through the city. You can stick to these in case you have business in the Upper City,” he said, with a polite nod to Aradia and Eridan, “Or you just feel like stopping by in the city of your oppressors for… fun, I guess?”

Karkat met his eyes, and much to John’s amazement, he was grinning. That really was a mouthful of teeth. 

“Oh, and I brought these,” he said, digging into his backpack to withdraw a handful of bullets from his bandolier. “These are what standard-rank Lamplighters are equipped with, and what Gamzee got hit by. Um, are any of you good with weapons?”

The bullets were passed down the table to Vriska.

“Alchemical rounds?” she said, looking stunned. “You humans aren’t fucking around anymore, are you?” 

“Vrithka, you shouldn’t call them ‘you humanth’,” Sollux said.

“Yes. Some of them are our friends,” Aradia said, looking curiously at John.

“As long as you stick to the routes that the map says are safe, or your underground passageways, you should be fine. But no, they’re not… they’re not fucking around. Any Lamplighter who they think is a troll sympathiser will be executed.”

“What happens if it’s you?” Karkat said instantly, his steely stare meeting John’s. “What if they find out you’ve been helping us? What if it’s you, me, and a dark alley, John? Are you going to shoot me and save yourself?”

John didn’t yet know how to reassure any of them that he could be trusted.

“I’m not going to shoot you. Any of you. Just… stay away from me, okay? You don’t know me. Try and stay in the shadows, don’t travel until after eight at night unless you really really have to, and I’ll help you all as much as I can. Keep this map and just make sure you don’t wander off the safe paths.”

“And what if you’re lying to us right now? What if all those routes you marked on there are dangerous? What if this is a trap?” Karkat growled. If the trolls hadn’t been concerned before, they certainly were now; eleven sets of accusatory eyes narrowed in his direction while Jade, Rose and Dave looked anxious.

“Karkat, even when you were stood ten paces in front of me I wouldn’t shoot you. Even when you took my gun and held it against your own forehead I was never going to pull the trigger! I don’t want to kill you. I know it would be easy, but I won’t do it,” John insisted, and Karkat’s lip curled.

Feferi sat up in her chair, smiling. It was a sign she was taking over now, and John deferred to her.

“I suppose, then, it begins,” she said, looking around the table. “Not much has really changed, and we still need to scavenge from the Upper City and do what business that we can. We just have to be more careful! Stick to John’s routes and don’t do anything stupid. Now, does anyone have any questions?”

“I have one,” Eridan said, and John turned his head towards him.

“What is it?”

“Can somebody get this guy a drink?” he said, and this was met by a jovial roar of approval.

* * *

Everyone had left by now. It was just him and Karkat, sitting at the bar and splitting a beer in the sputtering light of the last couple of lanterns. John felt warm.

“By the way, Karkat, do you want your jacket back?” he said.

Karkat shook his head. “You keep it. If I already know you as well as I think I do, your wardrobe is probably stuffed full of Lamplighter crap and not much else.”

“Yeah, that sounds about right,” John said, laughing.

“Then you need something to help you pass as a civilian. So keep it.”

“Thanks.”

“And then if you ever shoot me it’ll hang around and haunt you for the rest of your life,” Karkat said, half-joking… but not quite.

“I’m really not going to shoot you, you know. I never wanted to for a second,” John said quietly, pouring the last dribble of beer in the can into Karkat’s cup. “That’s too horrible.”

Karkat sipped on froth, then licked his lips.

“For a total fuckass Lamplighter stiff, you’re not so bad,” he said.

John took this as great praise, suddenly finding himself grinning from ear to ear.

“That’s the nicest thing anyone has ever said to me,” he joked.

“That would be funny except for the fact that, really, it’s true, isn’t it?” Karkat said, watching him with a smirk. John thought on this.

“Um… yeah.”

“Fucking hell. You are tragic.”

John laughed, and then checked his watch.

“My shift starts in four hours,” he said, wincing. “I better go.”

John stood with a scraping of stool against floor, and drained his beer.

“Listen, Karkat, I’ll… I’ll see you around.”

“Sure.”

John turned to leave, and made it halfway across the room before Karkat said, “John.”

“What?”

He looked over his shoulder at Karkat, but as ever his expression was inscrutable; his hollow yellow eyes were fixed on him, a little narrowed, and his lips were fixed in a frown, a couple of snaggly fangs poking out. That was how he always looked.

“Ah… never mind. Seeya.”

“Yeah, bye,” John said, with a smile that Karkat did not return.

The thought of what Karkat might have wanted to say to him didn’t leave John until he fell asleep.


	6. The World Could Be Burning

A book tumbled out of John’s hand and landed with a thunk on Karkat’s horned head. 

“Ouch! For fuck’s sake Egbert, watch what you’re doing up there!” Karkat hissed, trying to bellow quietly.

“Whoops! Sorry.”

It had been two weeks since John had declared his loyalty to the trolls. In that time, a memo had been circulating at work, that part of the stock of the city archives was to be bonfired – more specifically, any book that had anything to do with trolls was doomed. Upon hearing this news, Karkat had been completely aghast, and now John found himself at the top of a wobbling ladder in a back room of the central library, in the company of a cranky little troll with a taste for literature. It was four in the morning, so they were alone. The vast storeroom was dark, lit only by the lamplight that dribbled in from the old, grubby stained-glass windows, kindling the room with brown and orange tones and casting minutiae of speckled light over the dusty surfaces.

He scanned his eyes over the plethora of book spines stretched out before him, squinting in the lowlight to try and pick out any interesting titles. There were more books than he’d ever seen in his life – bookcases twenty feet high jammed in tight against all four walls, ringing a central reading area with desks and chairs that looked as though they hadn’t been touched in years. The study of trolls had always been something of a taboo. John carefully slipped a book out of its row.

“How do you feel about _The Troll Glandular System: Common Misconceptions_?” John said down to Karkat, and Karkat considered this for a minute.

“Could be a fun read, if only because your human attempts to understand trolls are pitiable at best,” Karkat rasped in reply, quietly, and John rolled his eyes.

He stuffed the book in his backpack, which was hanging precariously from one shoulder and threatening to overbalance him if he didn’t pay attention. Then he looked back at the shelf. There really was a wealth of knowledge here, on everything from social organisation and living habits to respiratory and cardiovascular systems. He almost wanted to take a few for his own perusal. It had been several years since he’d last picked up a book for pleasure.

Suddenly, one title caught his eye.

“Um… wow,” he said, flushing.

“What?”

“ _The Reproductive System and Sexual Habits of Trolls: An Illustrated Guide_ ,” he read, removing the book from the shelf. A pair of trolls was entwined on its cover, depicted not as barbaric savages, but instead there was something soft and supple about their forms – not much to distinguish them from humans, actually. He looked down at Karkat, who was gawping up at him, looking discomposed. “You want it?”

“…Sure. And wipe that stupid grin off your face.”

John snorted and put the book in his backpack. It was getting pretty heavy now, so he descended the ladder rungs. They’d been here for a couple of hours, and somehow John had ended up being the one to lug around the heavy bag of books, with no option of tagging out. He didn’t mind, because this night seemed to be making Karkat happy – at least, John thought so. It was hard to tell.

“Okay,” he said, as he stepped down from the last rung, “What else do you want?”

So far they’d taken textbooks on medicine and physiology, in case of further injuries amongst their group, as well as a few books on troll and human history, and the troll texts they’d pilfered from this section. Karkat looked shifty for a second, and John furrowed his brow.

“Fiction,” he said, and John blinked at him.

“Fiction? Like… what kind?”

Somehow John couldn’t quite imagine angry, barbed Karkat sitting cross-legged with a storybook. The mental image was funny, actually.

“Romance, of course. What else is there worth reading?” Karkat said, and John just boggled at him. He pushed his glasses up his nose.

“Was that sarcasm, or…?”

“What? No. How dare you. Granted, human romance is a feeble imitation of what _we_ have, with none of the drama of quadrants or vacillation or bodice-ripping hate-fucking, but there’s something enchantingly simple about a system where only matespritship is fully explored,” Karkat soliloquised, a faraway look in his eyes.

“Well, gosh. You’re… something else, Karkat,” John said, eyes crinkling. “Also. What is hate-fucking? That sounds horrible.”

“You exemplify my point, John. Try as you might, you’re only human and don’t have access to the same strength or depth of emotion as we do. The concept of kismesissitude would be wasted on you.”

John nodded, and then pressed his lips together.

“What?”

“Exactly. Lead the way, and I’ll explain,” Karkat said, and John suppressed a sigh. He wasn’t too sure if he even wanted to know – it sounded awfully confusing, and that was a lot of long words to describe just love – but all the same he led Karkat out of the room and down a dark corridor, and let him talk at him while they walked.

“There are four types of romance in troll culture, whereas you have only one. Whether this is because you’re emotionally stunted as a species is still up for debate. The quadrants are matespritship, moirallegiance, auspisticism, and kismesissitude.”

John wasn’t entirely sure he could pronounce those words, let alone wrap his head around what they meant. He adjusted the weight of his backpack and let Karkat continue.

“Matesprits are what you would recognise as a ‘couple’. Lovers, essentially. And kismeses are similar, but the relationship is based on mutual hatred rather than love. Moirallegiance and auspisticism are platonic relationships, where moirails rely on each other to control certain aspects of their personality that might be damaging or… well, fucked up. Finally, the role of an auspistice is to moderate a black, hateful relationship between two other trolls. Do you understand?”

“Well, kind of,” John said. He was trying.

“Blackrom is more or less unheard of today, though. I suppose humans hate us enough that we don’t need to hate each other too,” Karkat said, with a sigh. John didn’t know what to say to this, because it was sad, so they just kept walking for a minute or two.

“So, you – do you have a – mate-thingy?” he eventually hazarded to ask. The image of Karkat lying in someone else’s arms didn’t quite sit right with John, although whether it was just because Karkat was such a fierce little guy, or for some other reason, he couldn’t tell. There was a pause.

“Uh, no. Actually I’ve been historically unsuccessful in that quadrant,” Karkat replied, and John laughed, but not cruelly.

“Don’t worry. Me too.”

“Yes, John, I can’t tell you how reassuring it is to be as unlucky in love as you… a fleshy human half-wit,” Karkat needled back, and John gave him a long-suffering grin.

“Maybe if you were a bit kinder –”

“Fuck you, Egbert. I’m flawless,” Karkat said, breezing past him (not that he knew where he was going). At the end of the corridor, where it split into two, Karkat turned around and John caught up with him.

“Yeah, you’re right,” John said, and Karkat grinned up at him. A single lantern in the wall was still aflicker, and it cast a flattering caramel light over Karkat’s features, softening all his angles and catching his huge eyes. Gosh. “Uh, left here,” John eventually managed to spit out.

They continued down the corridor.

“You have a moirail though, right? Gamzee?”

“Yes, although it’s to his benefit rather than mine. Gamzee is… well, he needs someone to keep an eye on him, let’s put it that way,” Karkat said.

“I see. And what about the others?”

“They’re mostly broken hearts. Kanaya and Terezi have Rose and Dave, obviously. Vriska and Kanaya are moirails, and so are Equius and Nepeta. Eridan’s inability to hold anything down in any quadrant is infamous. He’s flushed for Sollux but I don’t think he even knows it yet,” Karkat explained.

“Flushed? Like, a crush?”

“Yes, like that.”

“Does Sollux…?”

“As far as I can tell, yes, but it’s going to take something big to get a confession out of either of them. They both hate themselves too much to think anybody might want them in any quadrant,” Karkat said, and snorted.

“Wow. You were right about the drama.”

“Yes, well, welcome to my life. I deal with the daily ups and downs of their love lives. They seem to think I’m the relationships expert.”

“But you’re not into anyone?”

“I’m keeping my options open,” Karkat said off-handedly.

“Does that mean yes or no?”

“It means mind your own business, you shit,” Karkat replied, and John just laughed and said, “Fair enough!”

* * *

Karkat had wanted all the romance novels. _All of them_.

“I think my back is broken,” John groaned as he staggered through the door at the bottom of the Living Room’s staircase. It was pitch black in the bar – it was, after all, six in the morning, and everyone would have gone to bed a couple of hours ago. With his backpack threatening to pull him over backwards, John lurched towards a booth near the door and lit the candles on the table with his lighter. Then he threw off his stuffed bag, letting it fall with a thump onto the table, and collapsed into the booth. Karkat joined him, sitting opposite.

“You should’ve said. I would have carried them for you,” Karkat said nonchalantly, as John quietly shrank with pain across from him.

“You would _not_ ,” John croaked, eyeing him. John still hadn’t made up his mind whether he thought Karkat was a sociopath or just a dick. He was leaning to the latter, though, because there were moments where Karkat was actually kind of nice to him. Karkat just grinned wickedly at him, and then removed a few choice books from John’s bag.

Somehow, the text on troll reproduction had worked its way to the top of the pile.

“Oh, wow. This should be amusing,” Karkat said warily, and he set the book down in the middle of the table so they could both see it. John felt weird suddenly, leaning in apprehensively. Did he really want to know how trolls got it on? He’d felt awkward enough when Eridan had suggested it to him, and to broach the subject like this with _Karkat_ of all people…

Karkat cracked open the book at its contents page.

“Chapter one: urogenital system of the troll male,” he read, and then flicked his wicked eyes up at John, and grinned.

“Karkat, this is so weird,” he said, but then he laughed. “But, okay, I’m curious. Go on.”

Karkat turned to the first page of chapter one, which was a colour-plate of the most disturbing and slimy thing John had ever seen. It was like a tentacle, or something, pale grey in colour and coated in jade green ooze, and rippling with bulging veins. And it was so… long. And wriggly.

“Um… really?” John said, blinking at the picture. “Well that’s, uh, unique? I guess?”

Like him, Karkat was staring down at the tentacle-thing with a perturbed expression.

“Sorry to disappoint, but that is really… not what we have,” Karkat struggled, as though he were actually lost for words, for probably the first time in his life.

“Oh. What do you have?”

Karkat looked at him.

“You’re really asking me that. Wow.”

“Uh I mean – don’t – um – I’m just wondering – this is awkward –”

Karkat laughed, an evil little snicker that curled his lip. “If you want to know, you should speak to Eridan. I’m sure he’d show you his any time.”

“I don’t want to see Eridan’s – no! No!” John had actually put his hands over his eyes to try and shield himself from the mental image, and Karkat was just laughing.

“We’re not _aliens_ , John. If you ever do find yourself naked with Eridan – which is really, really gross to think about – you’ll find that we’re basically similar.”

John peeked out from between his fingers.

“I can’t believe we’re having a candlelit conversation about dicks, Karkat.”

“Don’t pretend like you didn’t want to know.”

“I was just curious! I regret everything,” John said, laying his hands on the table.

“There are more similarities between humans and trolls than there are differences, you know,” Karkat said, flipping to a random page in the book that, mercifully, didn’t have an illustration. “We’re very closely related.”

“Really?”

John inspected Karkat. The trolls were quite obviously humanoid in form; they were as smart as humans, and had the same complexity of culture, too. The differences were subtle and superficial– the grey skin and the horns, the harder nails, the dark hair and yellowy eyes. 

“Really. Actually as far as we know, we have a relatively recent common ancestor. It’s all very interesting. But the most important thing, John,” he said, jabbing a finger at the open pages in front of him, “Is that we, pretty much, have sex in the same way.”

“Good to know,” John said, defeated. “You’re a bigger pervert than Eridan.”

“Don’t let him hear you say that or he’ll try twice as hard,” Karkat said, snorting as he snapped shut the sex book. John gave a sigh of relief as Karkat withdrew another book, one of his romance novels.

“I still can’t believe you read those. I mean, that one’s written for middle-aged ladies, Karkat.”

“Excuse me, Egbert, but I think you’ll find that anyone is free to enjoy a well-weaved romance,” Karkat said. John was quickly noticing Karkat’s little quirk of calling him by his surname when he was schooling him on something. It was endearing. John figured that if he told Karkat that he was cute, however, he was going to get a fist in the face, so he said nothing.

Karkat took out another book, frowning at it immediately.

“What’s that?”

“ _An Examination of Troll-Human Relations at the Inception of Darkhaven_.”

Now he was scowling at it like it was something absolutely reprehensible.

“What’s so bad about that?” John asked.

“Exactly one hundred percent of what humans write about troll history is categorically wrong,” Karkat growled.

John stared at him.

“You’re telling me that everything I learned in school was lies?” he said, warily.

“Yes. You’re even more indoctrinated than the average asshole, because you’re a Lamplighter,” Karkat said, smirking meanly as he turned to the first chapter.

“So you didn’t invade –”

“No, that is not what happened,” Karkat snapped. “You shithead.”

He didn’t even wait for John to ask before going on.

“The trolls had a peaceful subterranean civilisation, before suddenly the fucking ceiling opened and humans poured through, fucking everything up just like you did when you were living above ground, killing us left right and centre, demolishing our city – _our_ fucking city, Darkhaven, that’s what _we_ called it – and booting us to the outskirts of our homeland,” he ranted, flipping irritably through the pages.

A few moments’ silence followed. All John knew was that this had happened several hundred years ago, before either of them had lived. Now he had hundreds of questions buzzing around his mind, demanding answers, but he wasn’t sure if he wanted to accidentally push any more of Karkat’s buttons.

“We used to live above the ground?” he eventually decided to ask.

“Yes. That is, until you destroyed your entire fucking civilisation with war and industry, pillaging the planet and using it to fuel your eventual annihilation,” Karkat snarled. “Why do you think we scavenge so much from you? Your weapons are incredible. Human technology is reliably good at fucking shit up.”

“Wow. I didn’t know… any of that.”

“The fact is, John, you’re a human, which means you don’t actually know anything,” Karkat said, and John thought he felt hurt for a second – but then he understood. Karkat was aching for something he’d never even known, his ancestral people, and to hate those who stamped out most of his very civilisation seemed natural enough.

“How did you find this out?” John eventually said, and Karkat lifted his head, actually smiling now.

“An ancestor of mine. They called him the Sufferer,” he said. His eyes had that faraway look again. “Human invaders took him as a prisoner of war and he wrote letters in his own blood as a record of what happened. He managed to escape and stash the notes in a building far on the outskirts of town. I only found them a few months ago.”

“That’s so cool,” John said, grinning. “How did you know he’s your relative?”

Karkat’s smile vanished, replaced by an uneasy frown. John knew then that he’d probably made a complicated and devastating cultural mistake. He blushed.

“Sorry if that was offensive, um, I, like you said I don’t really know anything?” he garbled, and Karkat shook his head.

“Not offensive. It’s just complicated. You see, before humans came and made us all equally garbage, there was a rigid caste system in place that ranked trolls by their blood colour,” Karkat said. “The hemospectrum still exists, and there’s an element of rank involved – Feferi and Eridan are at the top of the heap because their blood would’ve made them nobility in the old days. But it’s nothing like it used to be.”

“You and your ancestor… you were at the bottom?”

Karkat snorted. “That would’ve been a significant improvement, actually. No. We’re blood mutants. We don’t even feature on the spectrum.”

“Oh. What colour?”

Karkat looked down.

“Red. Bright, human red. His words were red. I knew as soon as I saw,” he said, and sighed. “Like I said, it doesn’t matter anymore. But it used to be the difference between slavery and royalty.”

“You can’t help the way you’re born,” John said.

“But look, we’re in the same situation all over again,” Karkat said, wearily. “Trolls and humans. My bloodline never stopped being the underclass.”

“Maybe things will get better,” John offered, weakly, and Karkat just shook his head.

“Your naïveté is sweet, John, but sickening,” he said, and John accepted this as a compliment. “It’s late. Don’t you have work?”

“An afternoon shift, yeah,” John said, checking his watch. He would get three or four hours’ sleep if he headed back now. As much as he loved these late nights in the Lower City, he was certainly suffering for them. “I’ll head off. Can I… can I walk you home?”

“Yeah. If you want,” Karkat said, putting the book back in John’s backpack.

Without a word of complaint, John shouldered the bag and lugged it all the way back to Karkat’s apartment, where they separated, and John began the journey home, alone.


	7. Locked Doors

John _hated_ lamplighting in the Bazaar.

The district never slept. Right now, it was about eleven at night, and although shift was winding down and people were still milling excitedly around, packing every inch of the narrow streets. Tarps and awnings of a thousand rainbow-bright shades were hung from the buildings, shadowing merchants and barterers, and their furious chatter filled the air and pounded his temples. It was a great grinding stomach of activity, thumping and pulsing. The squares were especially frenetic, stuffed with suckers who indiscriminately snatched up what they could from the hundreds of market stalls, which groaned under the weight of the junk they were flogging.

For the umpteenth time, someone smacked directly into John. He bit down hard on the stream of obscenities that threatened to explode out of him, and caught something that she had dropped.

“Whoops! Sorry, ma’am – here’s your, uh, skull back,” he said, thrusting the unsavoury item back into her already piled-high arms. She said a muffled thanks and disappeared back into the enormous throng of people crowding around a street merchant, who was loudly exalting his wares underneath the blare of a towering great-lamp.

“That’s right ladies and gentlemen, step up, I’ve got some wonderful things to show you this fine evening. There you are, miss, there’s a spot to stand there. Now if you’ll all try and contain your excitement,” he said, and then clapped his hands together. John couldn’t even see him, but his speech was loud enough. “I’ll demonstrate the electromagnetic lampshade oscillator…”

That was stupid, John thought irritably, continuing down the soot-smeared streets. Not only was this part of town absolutely packed with chattering people, who for some reason thought it appropriate to crawl along at an absolute _snail’s pace_ when there was a city official trying to get through, but working here also required him to keep an eye open for any unsavoury merchants or otherwise black market goings-on. That meant arresting them when necessary, and he wasn’t the type to leap eagerly into confrontation.

He jammed himself in between throbbing crowds of people, his frown deepening as he had to circumnavigate a young couple whose hand-holding was making them far wider than they needed to be. Mimicking Karkat, he muttered “ _Redrom_ ,” under his breath, and then chuckled a little. It’d been a few days since he’d seen that grumpy little guy. He’d been so busy with Gamzee, who John had been delighted to hear was making a decent recovery – maybe he’d get to meet him soon, and then he would know the whole gang.

Managing to creep around the fringes of an enormous horde, he slipped into an alleyway, which was like emerging from a fathoms-deep lake. He took a deep breath and tugged at the lapels of his Lamplighter jacket, pulling them a little closer against the sudden chill – it was much warmer surrounded by people. As he walked, he whipped out his lighter and lit the wall-lamps lining this crooked alley. They flickered into life in his wake, throwing forward a sputtering amber glow and casting a few scattered figures into sudden illumination.

“Good evening,” John said, jerking his head to them as he walked by. Most of them were harmless; technically he was supposed to arrest homeless people for detention and punishment in the Bastille, but they weren’t hurting anybody where they were. Mostly they didn’t reply to him, but a few looked up and gave him watery smiles, a thanks for turning on the light. It was terrible in the dark.

Near the mouth of the alley, where it re-emerged into a packed square, two men were trading in the dark, until he flicked on a nearby lamp. Startled, they both balked and turned their pale faces to him. One of them, a young, rangy-looking lad, slid out a dagger, which caught the light of the guttering lamp. John smiled pleasantly at them.

“Let’s keep it civil, okay?” John said, gesturing to the guns holstered at his hips, plainly visible under his short jacket. The knife disappeared again and John crossed the distance between them. “What have you got there?”

The one without the knife had quickly stashed something into his greatcoat, but that hadn’t escaped John’s notice. With an enormous scowl, he took the offending items out again. There, in each wooly mittened fist, was a horn. They were each about ten inches long, curved, and grey in colour, with sickle-sharp points.

“Horns?” John said, lifting an eyebrow.

“ _Troll_ horns,” the guy rasped, and then chuckled. “You want ‘em?”

“Why would anybody want that?” John said back, looking at the man who had obviously been intending to buy them. They weren’t even troll horns.

“They’re good for, er… well… you know,” he said, but then trailed off, looking shifty.

John shook his head. “I’m not sure what you’re referring to.”

“Helps you please the ladies,” the supplier said, followed by a wheezy laugh that somehow sounded like nails being dragged down a chalkboard. John winced, but couldn’t help his face from splitting into a grin. “You don’t need any help with that? Shame. Still, look atcha. Strapping young lad. Not like this bastard.”

He got a slap on the arm for his comment, and the buyer said, “Terrence, just hand the fuckin’ horns over, my brother will have my ass if I’m not back by midnight!”

John wouldn’t stop them from trading. If the black market thought that troll horns were grey then it would stop the circulation of the genuine article, which was probably a good thing.

“You’re not gonna arrest us are you, mate? We’re not hurtin’ anybody,” the merchant said, as he passed the horns to the kid in front of him. A few notes were handed over in exchange, the kid doffed his hat, and then dashed into the square.

“Well, I can’t do anything about him now,” John said, although he’d made no effort to start after him. He couldn’t really be bothered, and it didn’t particularly matter. “I can let you go, but I’ll need something in return. What news have you heard lately?”

The man was grinning at him, a huge toothless crescent, and John smiled back, pushing his glasses up his nose. This wasn’t exactly mandated Lamplighter behaviour, but maybe he’d hear something that could help the trolls.

“Well, rumour has it that there’s to be a party at the mayor’s on Saturday night. Seems like she’s trying to strike some political deal. The head Lamplighters are invited, as well as the top academics and alchemists and weapon suppliers.”

“What are they meeting for?”

A wink, and then, “They’re saying it’s a ball, but that’s just what they’re callin’ it. You know it’s gotta be about trolls. It always is.”

John nodded. “Alright. Thanks. Uh, look after yourself.”

“You too, kid.”

* * *

“Eridan, I look dumb!” John insisted, on the verge of stamping his foot like a petulant toddler. He refused to even look back in the mirror, turning his pout and narrowed eyes to Eridan, who was just smirking at him. “You can pull this stuff off, okay! I just look like a kid!”

“Alright, shortstack, cool your jets,” Eridan said, clapping his hands on John’s shoulders, but John threw them off.

“We’re the same height!” he snapped, and Eridan just laughed.

Exasperated, John ran a hand through his hair and paced around the room like a stressed animal – which, actually, was exactly what he was. He had shared the news of the mayor’s party with the trolls, and because Eridan and Rose had both been in the room at the time, able to bounce their extravagant and _dangerous_ ideas off one another, an elaborate and ridiculous plan had hatched that they should infiltrate the party, and who could go? Not Jade, because she was an outcast, and not Dave, because he attracted attention wherever he went, so obviously, _obviously,_ the most logical conclusion was that Rose and John should go!

“I am not happy about this. At all,” John announced, but no one was listening. He, Eridan and Sollux were in the main area of the Living Room. Rose, Kanaya and Jade were upstairs, probably lacing Rose into a dress that would make her look totally gorgeous, whereas John looked like a complete moron.

It wasn’t that Eridan’s clothes were gross. Actually, Eridan looked fantastic no matter what he was wearing. But Eridan was _actually handsome_ whereas John was overwhelmingly plain-looking in almost every way. He was also a good deal more muscular than slender, sleek Eridan, and so the white button-down and cream waistcoat he was wearing were just a little stretched over his chest. The brown pinstripe tuxedo jacket just fit, a comfortable cling across his broad shoulders.

“C’mere, you big grump. Let me do your bowtie.”

John scowled, but let Eridan tie the bow anyway. It was crimson, apparently to match Rose’s dress, which she probably was going to look jaw-dropping in.

“There. Don’t know what you’re gettin’ so het up about, you big baby. You look just fine. Right, Sol?”

Sollux looked a little startled, tearing his gaze away from what seemed suspiciously like Eridan’s ass (yes, John had noticed, and was now suppressing a knowing grin), to look at John.

“Ed, you know I don’t know a thing about thith,” Sollux said, grinning to reveal his pointed fangs. “Whatever, you look great.”

Eridan looked triumphant, but John was not convinced. Suddenly the door swung open and bashed into the adjacent wall.

“KARKAT! WATCH THE WALLS!” came a furious wail from Rose’s apartment upstairs.

“John? Is that you? You look like a classier Eridan,” Karkat said, swinging the door shut behind him.

“Tell him he looks good, Kar,” Eridan said, lip curling at the implicit insult.

“What does it matter what he looks like, as long as they don’t recognise him?” Karkat rasped, striding across the room to stand beside them, smirking meanly. He swiped John’s glasses right off his face and hung them from the neck of his shirt. “There. You look a bit less like a tool now.”

Sollux and Eridan laughed, and John just stood, looking despondent. And now everyone was blurry, too.

“Come on, Egbert. You look fine,” Karkat said, “Stop being so precious about it.”

“Really?”

“Yeah, really.”

John was grinning again. Karkat would’ve told him the truth.

“Nobody’s gonna be lookin’ at you anyway, grumpy. Look at _Rose_ ,” Eridan said, waving his hand to the back door, from which Rose had just emerged.

“Well, fuck,” Karkat said, blinking incredulously at her.

Rose had always struck John as particularly beautiful, with her narrow pixie-like features and wispy blonde bob, but tonight she looked almost ethereally lovely. Her legs were draped in a crimson tulle skirt that brushed the floor, and her torso was bound in a frilled crimson corset, beneath which she wore a simple but elegant cream blouse with lace panelling. The red of her lipstain popped against her pale cheeks, and her coral eyes had been lined with kohl so that they were alluringly catlike. A rose had been wound into her hair, to match her name, but – and John felt like a cheesy fool for thinking it – it could only _hope_ to be as beautiful as she was.

“Oh, John, look at you,” she said warmly, swanning elegantly across the room to take his shoulders in her palms.

“Wow!” Jade chirped, as she and Kanaya emerged from the doorway. “You both look great!”

“Where did you get all this stuff?” John said, staring at her outfit again. Eridan was right. Nobody would give him a second glance. She was the perfect distraction.

“Aradia let us borrow most of it. Kanaya supplied the rose, of course,” she said, smiling lightly as Kanaya placed a hand on her matesprit’s back.

Karkat was still gawking at the two of them. He and Sollux had clustered together, by a country mile the scruffiest pair in the room. Eridan had apparently sensed their insecurity, because he turned on them, grinning evilly.

“Who’s next? Kar, I think a li’l bowtie would be just precious on you – _ouch, you little shit_ –”

“Shall we go, John?” Rose said to him, her lined eyes glittering, and John nodded, stammering out a “Sure.”

“Damn it, Kar, you drew blood!” they heard, accompanied by Sollux’s laughter, as they ascended the stairs.

* * *

They had managed to pass through the barricade unhindered, into a quiet, dilapidated part of the Brume. It had been really fun to talk to Rose one-on-one for the first time in ages – recently they’d been so caught up in troll drama and shenanigans that they’d barely had five minutes to chat. But so far on their leisurely stroll they’d swapped stories on matesprits and moirails, and laughed about Karkat and Eridan, and talked about how formalwear was a ridiculous institution, and John had assured her that he had _always_ thought she was beautiful. Now, though, they were in the Upper City, and they were all business.

“May I take your arm, Lady Devery?” John said, but there was no chance of this coming across as suave because it was accompanied by a big goofy grin.

Rose chuckled. “Of course, Master Briggs,” she said, and slid her arm through his.

Lady Arabella Devery, plus one, was on the guest list (a copy of which John had just barely managed to swipe undetected from his boss’ desk). Unfortunately for her, Lady Devery would not be attending this evening, as she was currently preoccupied with a certain Aradia Megido, thus forming the perfect cover for their unauthorised entrance to the ball. It was made even _more_ perfect, however, by the fact that Lady Arabella looked very similar to Rose indeed; the choice had been masterminded by Karkat, who had spent the last four days grumpily staking out her garbage cans to catch a glimpse of her. It was genius. Master Briggs was a nobody, an invented person – nobody would notice that he was John, especially not with his glasses gone and his hair combed.

He was feeling more and more like a competent secret agent by the day.

Soon, they were in the Athenaeum, passing through its quiet streets and following the path lit by jaunty, colourful paper lanterns – a jarring, although amusing, similarity to the Lower City. The mayor’s manor was on the outskirts of this district, and before long they were at the end of her street; they took a left and followed the path, which was lit with almost twice the intensity of the rest of the district. Ushers and party attendees were milling about; a few of them bowed at Rose and John as they walked down the path, Rose carefully holding up the sides of her dress so they didn’t slip into the gutter.

They climbed the short staircase that led to the mayor’s elegant front door, and Rose gave the pageboy at the door her name.

“Lady Devery? Ah, yes, and a guest, good evening sir, wonderful. You may go through. Drinks are being served in the hall,” he said, rifling through his guest list. Rose gave him a gracious smile, and he opened the door for them, letting them pass under the marble arch of the doorway and into the resplendent entrance hall.

Beneath them were smooth, polished marble tiles, checkered in blue-grey and white, and overhead arced an enormous, intricately carved ceiling. A twin set of staircases swept up on the opposite wall, and between them stood a great walnut door, glossy and imperious, which was swung wide open. A long golden rug guided them to this door, and so they crossed the room, followed by a few groups of people dressed in their finery and jewels. The chatter was pleasant and bubbly, but unsettling in the way that haughty fakeness always is.

They passed through the door, and were now stood at the top of a staircase that unfurled downwards into the party. Rose gave his arm a gentle squeeze – she must have felt him tense up at the sight of his boss, who was stood on the edge of the room, sharing a bottle of wine with a man John didn’t recognise. He looked at her, and they shared a brief smile before descending the staircase into the great hall.

He had thought the entrance hall was beautiful, but this vast, circular room was breathtaking. Exquisitely glossed cream marble tiles covered the floor, and the walls were half-walnut, half-navy paint; they swept up to meet a high ceiling, which like the one in the entrance hall was ornately decorated, boasting a delicately-coloured mural of a lady with some fruit. The walls were set with many windows, which let in syrupy lamplight, adding a warm undertone to the bright white light of the wall chandeliers. A harpsichord stood in the opposite corner of the room, beside a long wooden table, coated in blue satin, that stretched the width of the hall. Someone was seated at the instrument and playing a beautiful and complicated melody, whose notes weaved through the babble of the landed gentry.

“This is certainly grand,” Rose observed quietly, eyeing the painted ceiling.

John and Rose crossed the room, weaving between clusters of people and waiters and waitresses to sit around a relatively secluded table, shielded by the backs of the nearest conversation.

“What sort of news do you expect they’ll reveal?” Rose asked, and John thought about this.

“I haven’t heard anything at work – it’ll probably be nothing,” John said in hushed tones, “It might even be good news, which would make a neat change!”

Before Rose could laugh with him, however, the sound of metal hitting crystal reverberated through the room, and the pair of them stood. John had several inches on most of the people in the crowd and so he could see over their heads that the mayor, stood behind the long table at the far side of the room, had commanded everyone’s attention.

And she was certainly attention-worthy. Darkhaven’s government was more-or-less technocratic, which meant that the most mechanically apt people were likely to take power. And Calliope was mechanically gifted indeed, as well as imposing. She stood at least six feet tall, pale with a shock of white hair, and she had a metal arm, which was like Vriska’s but sleeker, shinier brass, and quieter as she moved it. It also had a slick automatic rifle built-in, the muzzle of which flashed at the crowd as she gesticulated.

“What a pleasure it is to have you all here this evening,” she said, “Welcome to the third annual Mayor’s June Ball. If I may, I’d like to take this chance to say that you all look wonderful.” This was met by general laughter and a murmur of chatter. “Now, you all know I prefer to keep politics out of this sort of event, but over the last few weeks I have been receiving certain information that will, I feel, put us in a much better mood for the next few months at least.”

A thread of curious whispering weaved through the crowd. People were smiling, now, raising their eyebrows over sipped drinks.

“My dear brother, Lord English, has been doing an excellent job in his first few years in charge of the Lamplighters. Before I go on, I’d like to thank him for all his hard work, especially most recently. So, thank you, Caliborn.”

Everybody applauded; John and Rose clapped politely, but with inward insolence. As the applause tapered off, the mayor continued.

“The number of reported troll sightings in the Upper City has decreased. Not by fifty percent, or eighty, but in fact _one hundred percent_.”

This was met by an utter, but of course well-mannered, _explosion_ of applause; people called out “Hear hear!” and, predictably, “Wonderful!”. John and Rose grinned at each other conspiratorially. It _was_ good news. The trolls were still sneaking around in the city, but nobody had seen them.

“Obviously we sent them a loud and clear message last month when we captured one of their number and had it dealt with in the Bastille. Indeed, not only has the threat of troll incursion fallen for the time being, but many of the Lamplighters have ascended the ranks and are better-equipped. Now our city is safer than it ever has been from the threat that lurks in the Lower City, and we can all sleep peacefully again. I know that it has been difficult as of late, and I would like to thank all of you for remaining vigilant and brave in the face of such dangers. You may now rest easy, my friends.”

There was applause again, and this time John and Rose joined in enthusiastically and genuinely. For now, it was safe. The audience were so unabashedly delighted that Calliope had to rap on her crystal glass with her metal fingers again to quiet them.

“Now, some of you will no doubt be wondering about our plans, with regards to the Lower City. We have no intention of mounting any form of official assault against the trolls, however, in the name of putting those foul grey-skinned beasts back where they belong –” another cry of “hear hear” rang out from the crowd “—the laws on property damage and assault against the person will be relaxed in the case of trolls. Now, I’m not _telling_ you to go out and give them what-for, but there are certain… opportunist sects of this society. The trolls will soon learn that it is foolish to try to stand against us.”

She raised her open hand to the sky.

“Light is strength!” she cried, the Darkhaven city motto, and everyone in the room raised their hand and called it back to her. Then she took her seat, and the bubbling of conversation slowly rose to a boil again.

“So, was that good or bad?” John said quietly in Rose’s ear, and Rose inhaled deeply.

“They aren’t _officially_ planning to destroy the Lower City, which is certainly a good thing. The only threat that’s posed to it now is that from petty criminals, which could be problematic, as you know what happens to trolls who strike back at humans,” Rose whispered, and John grimaced. Violent trolls were arrested and publicly executed. Self-defence wasn’t a concept that registered with the Tribunal – not in the case of trolls.

“We can fortify the barricade, at least. Anyway, we should go and warn them, now, and they can decide what they want to do,” he replied, and Rose nodded shortly.

The two of them managed to pass unnoticed through the crowd. They fled the entrance hall and emerged into the now-quiet street; they then rounded a corner, and disappeared down a loosened grate into the tunnels, to return to the Lower City.

* * *

“If she really thinks that the half-wit dregs of your human society are going to scare us, she’s even stupider than she looks,” Karkat snapped, as John lay Eridan’s tuxedo jacket down on the bar.

“You think you can handle it, then?” John said, and Karkat snorted. “You’re not allowed to retaliate, Karkat! If they find out, they’ll have you killed!”

“Then we’ll have to shoot to kill, like you do! I cannot fucking _believe_ we have to sink to your level, but clearly that’s what it takes, because it’s fucking impossible to reason with your species!” Karkat frothed, slamming his fist down on the bar. 

“Kar, you don’t even know how to shoot a gun,” Eridan commented smoothly, which earned him a furious glare. Karkat’s cheekbones reddened.

“Oh, I can teach you – but, listen, you can’t kill anyone. You can use guns to deter them, _from a distance_ , if you _have_ to,” John insisted, and Karkat sighed furiously.

“The most important thing is to reinforce the barricade. The more difficult it is to get in, the less likely they are to target us,” Rose said, and, still coloured by an ugly cherry-red flush, Karkat deferred to her with a swift nod.

“Fine,” he grunted.

“Karkat, don’t get us wrong. We would love to see them hurt, too! But it won’t end well,” John said, and Karkat gave him a long, hard, and exhausted look.

“I get it, fuckass. God damn you sacks of shit,” he said, running a hand through his fluffy hair and looking defeated.

“It’ll be okay,” John said, patting Karkat on the shoulder. Miraculously, Karkat didn’t try and bite his hand off.

“Yeah. Thanks,” Karkat gruffly replied, and then suddenly he was actually smiling, all fangs and curled lip.

“Well, this has been fun,” Eridan said, pushing himself up from the stool he sat at. He checked his watch. It was eleven or so in the evening; the night was young. “Think I’ll head to the city. See what I can get ‘em to pay me for tonight.” He chuckled hoarsely.

Beside him, Sollux’s hand, laid on the bar, tightened into a fist. “Night, Ed,” he said, sounding just a little sullen.

“Night.”

Eridan left with a swish of his scarf.

“Maybe I’ll head back too,” John said, standing and grabbing Eridan’s jacket from the bar.

“Are you working tomorrow night?” Karkat suddenly said, and John stared at him.

“Uh, no?” he replied, eyebrows quirked. That was suggestive…?

“Meet me here at ten,” Karkat said, and John’s heart did the tiniest of jumps. Surely not a date. With _Karkat?_ “I need you to teach me how to shoot.”

John let out the breath he hadn’t realised he’d been holding.

“Uh, sure thing! Yeah. I’ll be here,” he managed, rubbing his forehead. Karkat passed him back his glasses, and he slipped them on. “Well, see you tomorrow!”

His voice had cracked and squeaked on the middle syllable of ‘tomorrow’. Hiding his blush with his swift exit, John absconded and headed home.


	8. Dancing With A Gun

**Notes for the Chapter:**

>  **Trigger warning:** (Non-violent) use of guns

John frowned.

He’d come out of a grate on an avenue adjacent to the Living Room, a little road that he knew pretty well, and he was accustomed by now to being greeted by bulb-shaped hanging lanterns glowing a pallet of beckoning colours. This evening, however, something was wrong; someone had pulled down the strings of lanterns and left the shattered glass and shredded paper strewn across the street. His booted feet crunched over the shrapnel as he marched down the avenue, chewing on his lip and throwing his gaze this way and that, as though daring the vandal to leap out of the shadows and attack him. They’d be a fool to, though, because his guns were holstered at his hips in plain sight.

He rounded the corner, and saw Karkat, standing with his arms folded and leaning against the door of the Living Room. John raised a hand in greeting and received but a curled smirk in response. Well, that was something! He couldn’t help but feel a little goofy under Karkat’s cattish stare; he was wearing Karkat’s hoodie, zipped up over an unironed flannel shirt, and a pair of grey jeans – in other words, the first things he’d grabbed in the ten minutes he’d had between his overtime (that he hadn’t signed up for) and when he had to leave.

“You saw the mess?” Karkat rasped as John kicked aside a broken bottle.

“What happened?” he said, swiping off his glasses to clean them on the cuff of Karkat’s hoodie.

“Just some human kids. They came while we were all asleep. But they woke up Gamzee and once they saw him, well… they fucked off pretty quickly,” Karkat said darkly, his eyes glittering.

John replaced his glasses. “They didn’t give you any trouble?”

“Not after that. We followed them to the barrier and started patching up the holes in it. A few people are still there,” Karkat said. “Anyway, let’s go.”

Karkat started off down the road, and John jogged a few paces to keep up with him – Karkat’s legs were short so his head-start didn’t last long.

“Where are we headed?”

“Vriska’s. She has guns, and a shooting range.”

“Awesome!” John said, grinning at his friend. This was going to be really fun, although it would probably make Karkat angry at him somehow – what else was new? “You’ve really never shot a gun before?” John said suddenly, remembering what Eridan had said. It seemed weird.

Karkat huffed. “I never had a reason to.”

“No, I get that! I wasn’t making fun or anything,” John spat out, over-eager to make sure Karkat knew John respected him, “You just seem like the type to take every kind of precaution.”

“Yeah, well, I thought of myself as a pacifist before all of this shit started happening, at least by troll standards. Now it’s kill or be killed,” Karkat grumbled, as they rounded a street corner.

“Well, I’ll look after you. I mean, everyone will look after you. I mean, we’ll make sure you can look after yourself, um,” John butchered, “I’m just trying to say we all have your back!”

Far from scathing, Karkat was grinning at him, fangs flashing under yellow lamplight. “John Egbert, you’re the most awkward loser I’ve ever met.”

“You like me, though.”

Karkat stopped, so that John had to turn and face him across a pool of grubby light streaming out of a suspicious-looking shop’s window. His friend had walked him to a more industrialised part of the Lower City, sparsely populated and more frugally decorated, so that even at this time of night they were very much alone on the pavement, and the factory racket was far-off and muffled somehow, by some weird rushing in his ears that John was pretty sure was his heart. Karkat just stared across at him, brow furrowed, yellowy eyes glinting in the dull light. He was a scruffy little thing, and tiny, but so intimidating and fascinating and John so so wanted Karkat to like him.

“Right?” he said, chuckling a little. Playing it cool.

“In spite of my better judgement, no, you don’t completely repel me,” Karkat said, and John was grinning in an instant. From Karkat, that was practically a marriage proposal. “Anyway, we’re almost there.”

Within a few minutes they’d arrived outside of an old warehouse that looked abandoned; the glass of its windows was mostly missing, cracked, or shattered; the door was just about hanging off its hinges and the roof was full of holes. Karkat strode up to the beaten door with John close at his heels, and then rapped his knuckles hard against it thrice, creating a clanging, echoing boom that could’ve summoned everyone in a two mile radius.

Instead, they got Vriska, who poked her head with its mane of bushy wild hair out from the crack between the doors.

“Well if it isn’t my favourite pair of assholes,” she said, chuckling to herself as she swung the door open. Karkat hopped backwards out of its path. “Come on in, shooting range is empty, just watch out for all the crap.”

They were now in a vast room that swept on for ages. The old decaying roof arced high overhead, leaving plenty of room for various contraptions that John could only assume were failed or ongoing engineering projects. Skeletal things, looking like something that had jumped out of diagrammatic books, others with wires and sharp edges pointing dangerously out, and every surface gleaming brass or darkly glowing cast iron with a slick patina. Other pieces were gorgeously carved and accented and hung with familiar troll colours, bright silks; innumerate brass devices and whirring mechanisms were strewn around, some of them spinning on their own time.

“Pretty – um – pretty cool, isn’t it?” said a little nervous voice, and John spotted Tavros wheeling towards them, a toolkit in his lap.

“You made this stuff?” John said, throwing his gaze around the room in total awe. Suddenly, standing in the middle of this huge room with all of these strange and unknowable things was making him feel very small.

”We’re pretty much experts,” Vriska leaned down to snatch the toolkit out of Tavros’ lap and capering over to what looked much like a pile of junk.

“That’s right,” Tavros said in a little voice, looking splendidly pleased with himself. “Vriska took over most of this ever since – well, um, ever since… you know.” He shrugged, eyes flicking down to his useless legs.

“She spends half her life upgrading weapons in here, even though she knows we’ll never have a chance to use them,” Karkat scoffed, as Sollux and Tavros left to help Vriska with her work. John cast his eyes around the vast room again, gaze sweeping along the walls that were lined with rack upon rack of guns and gadgets. Three silhouetted figures were painted on one of the walls, between two weapon cabinets. Their torsos were decorated with white rings – targets. He walked to them, and Karkat followed.

“She sure has a lot of weapons,” John remarked, swinging open one of the cabinets to find that it, too, was predictably stuffed with guns, but this time they were clearly the kind better suited to beginners; he withdrew a medium-weight revolver, which had clearly seen a bit of love as it was slightly battered around the barrel. “This should be good for you.”

He handed it over, and Karkat frowned immediately.

“Too heavy?” he said, suppressing his smirk. He could tell by the fury in Karkat’s eyes that he was not fully enjoying having to swallow his pride right now.

“It’s fine,” Karkat growled back, and together they walked to a line marked in chalk around twenty feet from the painted silhouettes. John stood right behind him, and he could feel angry heat bristling from Karkat, but chose to ignore this. He could see right over the top of the little guy’s head.

“You’re left-handed?” he said, peering down at the gun that Karkat was awkwardly holding in his left hand. He hadn’t quite figured out how to get his fingers around the grip.

“Yeah,” Karkat grunted in reply, and then held up his hand to let John help him. Carefully, John shifted Karkat’s stubby little fingers so that the bottom three were around the grip, thumb curled near the hammer and trigger finger extended.

“Don’t put your finger on the trigger unless you’re ready to shoot at something,” John said, and Karkat nodded, staring at the thing in his hand. John’s fingertips were still resting on his knuckles. Gosh his hands were warm. And surprisingly soft, save for his calluses. “Uh, you can rest it in the bottom of your other hand – just like that – supports it better.”

Now John was holding Karkat’s wrists and the gun was extended out in front of them.

“You’re sure it’s not too heavy?” John said in Karkat’s ear. He’d noticed the slightest tremor in Karkat’s forearm, although what it had been caused by, he had no idea.

“It’s fine, John,” Karkat snapped back, but John could hear the grin in his voice even if he couldn’t hear it.

“Good! Okay, look between the sights –” he pointed them out with a finger before returning that hand to Karkat’s wrist, “—and make sure that your target is down them.”

“Egbert, that’s the most frustratingly vague instruction I’ve ever been given,” Karkat snarled, but all the same he lifted his arms just a little, sighting the centre of a bullseye. “I didn’t realise you were so touchy-feely, either.”

John’s hands flew from Karkat’s wrists so fast it was like he’d been electrocuted.

“I was just making sure you were doing it right! Geez,” he flustered. “Anyway, you seem pretty good for a beginner. Your stance is perfect already.”

“What can I say,” Karkat chuckled. John rolled his eyes, and then pushed his glasses up his nose a little nervously.

“When you’re ready – and take your time, seriously – squeeze the trigger _slowly_ ,” John instructed him, and then rested his hands over Karkat’s ears. Soft hair, too… oh god.

A sudden merciful distraction came in the form of Karkat pulling the trigger a little more hastily than he should’ve; the recoil caught him unawares, shunting all of his little body backwards into John, who barely moved from the impact, and instead caught a flailing Karkat underneath his arms, shrugging off his own ringing ears. The bullet had missed the silhouette, instead hitting it just to the left of its head.

“And that’s what you get for being cocky!” Vriska cackled from the other end of the room, her taunt reverberating off the walls and ringing cruelly loud. Karkat snatched himself away from John and steadied himself again – and he’d been listening. His finger was no longer on the trigger, although if John had been in his position he probably wouldn’t have trusted himself enough to even hold the damn thing.

“The important thing is that you tried,” John said, and Karkat span on his heel, scowling. “Hey, come on, I’m just kidding around.”

Karkat’s chest was heaving, and a cherry-bright blush coloured his nose and cheeks.

“Are you okay? Do you wanna hand it over?” John said, eyeing him. “Everybody screws up the first time. Some more than others. Like me!”

“You’re insufferable,” Karkat breathed. “One more shot.”

“It took you by surprise, huh?” John said to the back of Karkat’s head as, once again, he rearranged Karkat’s fingers over the gun and helped him to sight the target. Karkat just grunted in response. John covered Karkat’s ears.

Again the shot boomed out, but this time Karkat just about kept himself steady, bracing himself back against John’s chest.

“Hey, you hit it!” John exclaimed, after he’d uncovered Karkat’s ears again. And it was true, he had – right in the middle of its face. “Great shot!”

Karkat just shrugged, and handed the gun back over – with a toothy grin, though, which thrilled John.

“I bet your hands hurt now, huh?” John said, swinging out the cylinder and removing the last couple of bullets.

“I think I’ll get used to it,” Karkat said. “It doesn’t seem that complicated.”

“It’s not, once you practice. We can try again next week if you want? Same time?” John said, accidentally sounding as hopeful as he felt. Maybe he just wanted to touch those tough little hands again. What were these things he was feeling? He headed to the cabinet, just to have something to do, and returned the gun.

“Sure. You’re a good teacher,” Karkat said behind him.

John chuckled, turning to face Karkat. “You’re a good student!”

“You’re going to make me sick,” Karkat said, snorting at him. “Get out of here.”

“So affectionate,” John giggled back. “See you later! Oh, bye, you guys!”

He raised a hand in a parting gesture to Vriska, Tavros and Sollux, and gave Karkat a huge cheesy grin (which was not reciprocated) before disappearing through the huge warehouse doors and starting off home.

* * *

He realised it, quite suddenly, when he was about halfway home, down a back alley in the Brume. He had never seen Karkat vulnerable before, at all, not until today when for a moment he was a mess of cherry-red cheeks and gun-stung palms and big yellowy wet eyes and maybe even _worry_ , that he’d done something wrong… that he wasn’t good enough?

The lamp overhead fizzled out with a sudden pop. John couldn’t even be bothered to stop to relight it. He was caught up in his thoughts.

John liked him so much! The other trolls were really cool, and he was sure when he finally met Gamzee he would be awesome too, but Karkat was just special in a way that John couldn’t explain. He almost wanted to rationalise that it was because Karkat was the first troll he’d ever met, his first tenuous link to his second life that had unfurled and radiated and become something beautiful and exciting. And yet that explanation seemed unsatisfactory somehow, like there was some other thing that he’d yet to consider.

Something about soft hands and hair and the way John could tell precisely whether Karkat was about to skewer or salute him just by the kind of curl in his lip and how many teeth he could see. He probably spent too much time staring at Karkat’s face. He wasn’t even handsome, at least conventionally, but John always found it hard to tear his eyes away. Even when it was all scrunched up and grumpy. But especially when he didn’t know John was looking.

What did it matter if he was handsome anyway?

_What did all these feelings mean?_

“Trouble shared is a trouble halved,” drawled somebody familiar out of the shadows, followed by a husky laugh. A silhouette emerged into what little dusky lamplight filtered down from the top of the alley, and John could just about make out the outline of a pair of crooked horns and a long scarf.

“Eridan! I – I’m fine, really,” John said, grinning in a manner that he was sure was not totally convincing. Eridan drew closer, until John could pick out all of his finer details, including the fact that tonight he happened to smell deliciously like dark chocolate and some incense that Rose was always burning.

He wondered how he was supposed to be a fine upstanding young gentleman when he was always surrounded by sinfully attractive trolls.

“Don’t look fine, John. I know an upset man when I see one. Hell, I make a livin’ off them,” Eridan said lowly, and John would be lying if he said that Eridan’s voice _didn’t_ make the base of his spine tingle just a little bit. How had he suddenly gotten so close? Close enough to be playing with the zipper on Karkat’s hoodie.

“S’cute that you wear this thing,” Eridan chuckled, glasses catching the dull light. “You two sure make a good couple.”

“Couple? What – what are you talking about – we’re not – it’s not like that,” John garbled, swatting Eridan’s hand away from his hoodie. “We’re just friends!”

Yes, yes, that was it. They were just friends. Good friends! That was why he liked him so much.

“Friends,” Eridan repeated. “So you wouldn’t mind if I just –”

He had rested an elegant hand on John’s shoulder and was now running the pad of his thumb over John’s ear. John bit his lip, but didn’t jump away. It… felt nice. And him and Karkat were just friends, so.

“No, I, uh, I do not think that, um, I would mind that at all,” John murmured, and then Eridan’s hand moved to the back of his head, fingers slipping through his hair and sending tingling ribbons down his neck. He accidentally hummed a tiny sound of pleasure, and Eridan grinned.

“He’s an idiot for not havin’ made a move on you by now,” Eridan said softly, tilting his head forward to rest their foreheads together. John was very much aware of his heart hammering inside of his skull. He thought he might explode. Nobody had ever touched him in a way that wasn’t platonic, and here was Eridan, a man who was basically sex distilled into troll form, petting his hair and… “I think I want you too much for my own good, John Egbert.”

And _wanting him_.

“This is a thing that is happening,” John clarified aloud, and Eridan’s smile only broadened.

“Fuck, John, you are the cutest lil’ thing.”

Now they were kissing.

Fuck those lips were soft and moist and so perfect and John didn’t even know what he was doing, this was his first kiss ever, but he was pliable and he let Eridan slip his tongue between his lips because for all of his inexperience Eridan had _plenty_ , and there was a hand on his waist and one playing the length of his spine and a heat between their mouths that he’d never known could exist and so – much – longing – Eridan was shaking underneath his clumsy palms where he’d laid them over the dimples of his back, and wow. Wow.

They broke for breath but only for a second, Eridan had grabbed him by a fistful of hoodie and pushed him up against the wall and now there were hot kisses at his neck and a tongue flicking against his earlobe and oh gosh he wasn’t even sure what he was doing with his body any more, his eyelids were fluttering and he was probably moaning out a symphony of stupid sounds and his knees were shaking but Eridan knew _exactly_ what he was doing and he was going to get what he wanted out of John because how could John possibly refuse.

Wait, Sollux.

“Stop,” John tried to say, but it got mangled with a groan as Eridan nipped the helix of his ear. “Eridan, stop! What about Sollux?”

To his credit, Eridan stopped immediately. But much to John’s surprise, he looked devastated. He leaned forwards heavily against John’s chest, still shaking, but not in a good way anymore.

“Hey, what – what was that? What is this? Are you okay? Eridan?”

“What about him?” Eridan choked out, in the tiniest voice. On instinct, John circled Eridan’s shoulders with his strong arms. “He doesn’t want me, for fuck’s sake, I’m a fuck up, have you seen me? I can’t fill a quadrant for anyone, I’m fuckin’ useless.”

Okay, this was all a pretty sudden change of pace, but John went with it. He couldn’t agree any less with Eridan’s estimation of himself. There was the fact that he was an incredible friend who, despite his slightly lecherous nature, was always there when needed, but also John was pretty sure Eridan had just forced him to confront the fact that his attraction to men was ‘a thing’ that was most definitely ‘happening’.

“Eridan, come on, you’re not useless, you know that,” John said, still a little bit dazed by it all, but it was fine. He rubbed Eridan’s shoulder a little. “I know you’ve been, um, unlucky and everything, but –”

“Unlucky!” Eridan squawked. “I wandered right into this fuckin’ situation, John, I sleep with men for money for fuck’s sake! What the fuck would Sollux want me for now I’ve slept with half the fuckin’ town?”

“I’m sure he doesn’t care about that! Noone should care about that!” John said firmly, still palming Eridan’s shoulder. “He likes you, Eridan, and he cares about you, and so do I, we _all_ do, okay?”

Eridan sniffed. John hadn’t even realised he’d been crying, but there were lilac tracks down his washed-out cheeks. Poor guy. He wished, he really, really wished that he felt flushed for Eridan, because he wanted for all the world to keep his arms around his shoulders forever. But he didn’t. Maybe it was that pale thing? He made a mental note to talk to Karkat about it.

“You really deserve to be happy,” John said. “Even if you never fill any quadrants. You’re a good guy. Better than a lot that I can think of! And, you know what, you’re a good kisser too. I’m just going to put that out there.”

Eridan laughed, now, and that was such a relief that John slumped back against the wall, still holding Eridan firm and close.

“Sorry about that,” Eridan said, “I – I feel bad – I was just–”

“Using me? Because… because of how you feel about Sollux, right?”

“Yeah. And then you brought him up and, well. I thought I could spend my life pretendin’ that I don’t feel anything red for any a those losers but, well, I got it bad for him, John. How did you know, anyways?”

“Karkat,” was all John needed to offer in reply before Eridan was nodding and sniffling, “O’course.”

They stood in silence for a while, John still holding Eridan close and comforting but in a way that they both knew was strictly non-sexual.

“This is feelin’ a little pale,” Eridan observed quietly, and John nodded.

“I don’t think I – this isn’t a rejection, please don’t cry again – I don’t understand that all well enough yet? But I would love to be your pale-thing once I feel like I could do a good job at it,” John said, kindly and sincerely, and Eridan seemed placated.

“Alright, then, moirail-to-be,” Eridan chuckled. “As for your redder quadrant… I ain’t a fool, Egbert. You and Kar, ‘just friends’?”

John choked on the first word he tried to say, and then answered, “Yeah. Friends. I mean, good friends and everything, but, I don’t think I’m his type.” He gave a nervous little laugh.

“Ah, maybe you’re right. Not sure he even has a type. Last flushed crush he had was on Rezi, and you can see how that turned out. Poor bastard. It jaded him pretty bad.”

John was blushing, now, and his stomach was churning with a weird mixture of pity and jealousy and anger. These were things he didn’t want to know.

“Listen, Eridan, it’s late, and I need to get back and I think you should probably go back too and… talk to someone,” John said, gently pushing Eridan up off his shoulders and wiping away the last film of lilac tears from Eridan’s cheeks.

“Sure,” Eridan said, giving him a watery smile. “Sorry about all that, John.”

“No! No need to apologise. It was really great, um, but let’s just not do it again.”

“Deal,” Eridan snickered, and then with a wink, disappeared into the darkness of the alley.

After a few minutes, the sound of his footsteps had been swallowed into the quiet of the night, and John was alone with his own breathing and bounding heart.

“Well _fuck_ ,” he said to the empty alleyway.

Everything just got a whole lot more complicated.


	9. Made For Each Other

_Dear John,_

_I thought I might issue this as a formal invitation; perhaps then we could pretend as though we were, as Dave puts it, ‘real adults’. Indeed, sometimes a little extravagance is quite pleasant – appropriate, even. I am still not quite sure how to put this appropriately, however, and having consulted with Karkat I find myself still at a loss. He is not altogether the most sophisticated of trolls, but that, as you know, is from whence his charm stems._

_Forgive my ramblings, I am just so terribly excited. As you know, the human traffic in the Lower City has increased markedly as of late, though we have fortified the barrier; a few of the passers-through have surprisingly transpired to be not that terrible, and so they have been allowed knowledge of the underground tunnels._

_But, Rose, I hear you say. Why are you telling me this wonderful news? You see, John, greater human presence in the Lower City means one thing for the Living Room – more patrons. Furthermore, if there is one thing that Eridan and Aradia have taught me over the course of our friendship, it’s that, dear John, sex sells._

_The Living Room is being re-marketed as a cabaret, and if you are able, we would be delighted to have you with us on Saturday night for the opening event. If it is of any extra incentive to you, there will be scantily-dressed Eridan. Granted, this seems to be more exciting to him than it is to anyone else, but all the same it should be a sight to behold._

_Apologies for blathering on. Kanaya and I are completely thrilled. We so hope you can join us._

_Warm regards,_   
_Rose_

* * *

Well, of course he had to wear a suit. The problem was that he looked totally stupid.

Standing in the middle of his bedroom, John was surrounded by casualties that draped in circles around him as though a bomb had gone off – discarded shirts, socks, ties that didn’t quite match, and a cravat that had once belonged to his father and had looked considerably more dapper on his old man than it ever could around his neck. He kept catching his reflection in his closet mirror and pulling a face, tongue stuck out, because somehow the clothes weren’t quite falling right.

His father had arranged for this suit to be tailored specifically for him on his eighteenth birthday – he’d written it into his will, a document that John sometimes looked back on and laughed, because even in death, Dad took this sort of thing seriously. The suit had fit perfectly then and he’d barely grown an inch, so why did it look so stupid now? He picked his way across the battlefield of crumpled clothes and stood before his closet mirror, tightening the knot of his tie.

He wore a starched white shirt and black waistcoat with brass buttons, and a grey pinstripe suit, jacket unbuttoned and falling crisp and near-elegant around his shoulders and waist. Kanaya had selected his tie for him – pale electric blue, to match his eyes, she’d said. With a sigh, he ran a hand through his errant dark hair, ruffling sections in a poor attempt to style the mess he probably should’ve learned to live with by now. 

“Hey handsome.”

“Dave!” John barked out, as he jumped a foot in the air and tried to spin on his heel, instead slipping on a fallen silk shirt and landing on his butt, bashing his head against the closet door for good measure. He could tell his glasses were askew and an ornery pain had started jabbing the base of his neck but he didn’t care – “God damn it, Dave, I thought I told you to stop – sneaking in through the window or whatever the hell it is that you do!”

Dave was sitting on the edge of his bed, smirking at him behind his dumb dark glasses. Stupid stupid stupid!

“Where’s my ‘hello’? I’m wounded, John. Practically heartbroken. I’d go home and cry myself to sleep if I didn’t know there was going to be…” Dave actually lowered his glasses to flash flame-hot irises at him, “ _Naked Eridan_.”

John barked a “Ha!” and, readjusting his glasses, managed to push himself to his feet. “What are you doing here anyway? It’s still early, isn’t it?”

Waiting on an answer, John eyed Dave up and down. Dave always looked utterly _fucking_ glorious in everything he wore, and tonight was no exception – a black shirt under an eye-scorchingly bright red suit that clung tight to his angular frame. On anyone else, that colour would have been a crime against humanity.

“I figured thatm as usualm my dorky bro John would be having a preteen meltdown in his room because he couldn’t decide what to wear,” Dave snarked, pushing himself up off the bed. “But tonight it turns out he looks pretty fine. What happened, Egbert? Your fairy godmother come? You are the Cinderella –”

“It is me, yeah, whatever, Dave I look dumb!” John insisted, worrying a button on his waistcoat between his finger and thumb.

“Nah. Look at you. C’mere.”

Dave grabbed him around the shoulders, tight, and manoeuvred him so that they were standing side by side in the mirror. With his best friend at his side, looking slick and casual as ever, he realised he didn’t actually look that bad.

“Problem is you stand like you have a stick up your ass,” Dave said, slapping it for good measure. John squawked furiously and tried to elbow Dave in the ribs, but Dave always managed to swing himself just out of the way of every jab. Stupid untouchable Striders.

“It’s hard to relax when your stupid-ass best friend doesn’t respect personal space or, or _property laws!_ ” John snapped, but then he laughed. He’d been friends with Dave for so long, this was par for the course.

“There’s something I wanted to talk to you about though, seriously,” Dave said, releasing his shoulders and returning to the bed, patting the space beside him. “C’mon. Mama Dave wants a heart-to-heart.”

Rolling his eyes, John sat down next to ‘Mama Dave’.

“Tell me about Karkat,” was all Dave said, and John stared at him.

“Tell you about him? You’ve met him, Dave, doesn’t that tell you all you need to know?”

Impassive, Dave said nothing. Dave knew, he _so_ knew that this was the easiest way to get information out of John – he barely needed any cajoling. Dave just had to sit, and stare, and wait until John felt so guilty that he couldn’t help but spill everything. Dave was his best friend, after all.

“I think he’s a really great guy,” John said, picking his words carefully, “And… he’s fun to be around, and I like spending time with him, and I feel like we’re really good friends already?”

No response.

“And last week I gave him a shooting lesson and we just had another one yesterday night and I can’t stop touching him and I feel like, it’s Karkat, why isn’t he biting my hands off?”

Still nothing. John felt the heat pouring into his cheeks. He might as well get it out now, the big secret, the great reveal.

“And I made out with Eridan and I think I might be a – a – a… homosexual,” he blathered, not quite looking Dave in the eye.

“Called it,” Dave said.

“But Karkat is – I – it’s just too confusing, Dave,” John groaned, burying his face in his hands.

“You want my advice? I’m just gonna go ahead and assume that you do, seeing as I am a god-damn genius,” Dave said, laying a hand on John’s shoulder. “Don’t try anything with Karkat.”

“I –” John started, but… “We’re just friends. That was never the plan, I swear.”

“Bullshit, Egbert. Maybe you haven’t realised it for yourself yet, but me, I know. Even Eridan has his suspicions. Honestly you spend half your time gazing at Karkat like some lovesick Romeo, only even more stupid, and you know I love the crap out of your goofy self but I don’t want to be your Mercutio when shit goes down. Which it will. Because Karkat… isn’t a great boyfriend.”

“How do you know that?” John snorted, and Dave didn’t say anything. “Oh you have got to be kidding me – you and Karkat? Are you serious?”

Again, nothing.

“When was this?! You clearly forgot to mention that this ever happened at any point in the last twenty years, you utter conksuck!” John clamoured, throwing Dave’s comforting hand off his shoulder.

“It was a couple years ago. The entire situation was just so god damn embarrassing that I spared you the pain of hearing about it,” Dave said, followed by a little ‘heh’. “He had a crush on Terezi the whole time we were together. Asshole. Stay away from him, John. He’ll only break your tender little heart.”

“What did he do?”

“It’s the little things, John. Like yelling out somebody else’s name in bed. I mean, that always stings –” 

“ _You slept with Karkat_ oh my god go home Dave, I’ll see you tonight,” John said, shoving Dave bodily out of his apartment by the shoulders and slamming the door.

* * *

“Aw, c’mon, Kar-man. Getcho relax on and forget ‘bout that motherfucker.”

John froze on the last step, hesitating at the sound of the unfamiliar voice. He had arrived a couple of hours early for the start of the Living Room’s opening show, but clearly he hadn’t been the only one to have that idea. Carefully, as silently as possible, he edged off the final stair, wincing as it gave the tiniest squeak against his weight. Whoever was in there, they were talking to Karkat, and in spite of his good nature, John wasn’t the type to avoid eavesdropping when he might learn something useful.

“Don’t motherfucking touch me – argh! Now you have me saying it too, you fucking tool!”

“I’m just tryin’ to help my best friend get his chill down on,” drawled the strange voice, and John frowned as he pressed his ear up against the keyhole. He could only assume that this was a troll he hadn’t met yet – maybe it was Gamzee, Karkat’s moirail? That made sense.

“I don’t want to get my chill up on down or whatever the fuck it is you keep saying! And I don’t want a fucking backrub! Get your hands off of me –”

Karkat went quiet suddenly.

“See? I got magic fingers,” chuckled the stranger.

“Shut the fuck up.”

A few moments’ quiet passed, interrupted by a little disgruntled noise from Karkat.

“You always press too hard,” he said, in a small, irritated voice.

“Sorry, little man. Easy to forget how tender you are under all that – _hey_ , what are you up and all biting me for, brother?”

“Not _tender_ ,” Karkat snapped, and Gamzee gave a lazy snigger.

John’s back was starting to ache from hunching over to the keyhole, and as adorable this was to witness, he kind of wanted to sit down. He knocked once, and then clicked the door open and stepped into the merry, familiar warmth of the Living Room, to find two trolls at the bar.

Karkat was hunched over his drink, dressed in a dark suit that fit just right over his knotty muscles and sharp angles. John swallowed the lump in his throat, and blinked instead at the other troll, who he hadn’t met before. Most strikingly at first was the white paint carefully caked onto his face. He had longer, slightly bent horns, and a shag of longish hair that probably needed a trim. And he was wearing a black and grey polkadot suit, which was not an aesthetic John was too familiar with, but somehow he pulled eccentricity off quite well.

This was Gamzee, John guessed?

“Aw, shit son,” Gamzee slurred, wearing a slanted toothy grin and tilting his head in Karkat’s direction, hooded eyes rolling, eyelashes aflutter. Karkat had gone wide-eyed and suddenly stood, mumbling something about needing the bathroom before disappearing through the back door of the Living Room, leaving him and Gamzee alone in the bar.

“Hello,” John said, then he cleared his throat and crossed the room, occupying the seat beside the one Karkat had just vacated. “Are you Gamzee?”

“That’s right, my brother. I been up in Karkat’s apartment getting’ my shit sewn back together, but here I am,” Gamzee said, sinking onto a barstool next to John. He smelled really, really strongly of something weird and sickly-sweet, and kind of musky. From this distance John could see a jagged row of stitches that cut a line from his ear to his lip. “But where’d that little motherfucker run off to all up and a sudden?”

“He sounded upset, before? I, uh, didn’t mean to eavesdrop, or anything,” John said, ears reddening.

“It’s cool, man,” Gamzee said, shrugging as he dug in his pocket and withdrew a beaten cigarette. “You got a light?”

“Sure thing,” John said, taking out his lighter and flicking Gamzee’s cigarette lit. Gamzee put it to his lips and sucked long and slow, letting a trail of syrupy-smelling smoke pour out of his nostrils.

“Motherfuckin’ miracles,” he said, and John smiled patiently at him as he repocketed his lighter.

“My name’s John, by the way.”

“John. You know what’s got my moirail all worked up?” Gamzee said, and John shook his head. “Quadrant shit, man.”

“Which… uh, which quadrant?”

“Red,” Gamzee said, taking another drag of the cigarette. “I already up and motherfuckin’ forgot who all his noise was about.” He shrugged, rubbing one bloodshot eye with the back of his hand.

“Oh. Well, I hope he feels better soon,” John said, casting his eyes to the back door. Karkat still hadn’t returned. “Say, what are you smoking, anyway?”

It was making John’s eyes itch. Gamzee just looked askance at him with a curled smile.

“Miracles, my brother. Motherfuckin’ miracles.”

* * *

They didn’t have a proper stage, but then again, they didn’t need one – the tables in the bar had all been pushed to the side of the room and the chairs had been arranged around a wide circle of floorspace, plenty of space to perform and perfectly intimate, too. On Rose’s request, John had killed the lights, and now only candle- and lantern-light lit the room, and all the wicks burning had coaxed the temperature up a few degrees so John found himself comfortably warm under the collar, sitting in the first row of chairs and waiting for Kanaya to open the evening. Karkat was on one side of him, Sollux the other, and both of them looked sullen. The audience was alive with vibrant and excited chatter and the clinking of glasses.

Suddenly, in the corner of the room, a player started up a quiet refrain on the piano, conjuring a light and lyrical melody that somehow put him just on edge, and silenced the audience. It put him in mind of a feeling he’d had before, that tonight he would be thrilled and challenged and disturbed, and he would love it. Heads turned, and eventually all eyes in the room settled on Kanaya, who drifted elegantly down an aisle between the chairs from the direction of the bar. The ruffles of her long black dress floated ethereally about her legs, a long slit revealing a line of supple grey flesh. She reached the centre of the stage as it were and turned this way and that to look upon her captive audience.

“Ladies and gentlemen, what a pleasure it is to have you here tonight,” she said gently, and the music dropped to a soft spattering of notes. John found himself grinning already. She looked so happy. “We have an evening of the finest entertainment in the district for your delectation. Before we begin, I would like to make plain that while _looking_ is encouraged… _touching_ is forbidden. Although if you’d care to spend the evening with our first act, I am quite sure he’d love to set his price. And now, for a man who needs no introduction, and one you aren’t likely to ever forget.”

Kanaya gave a section of the audience a mysterious wink before disappearing again down another aisle to take a seat in the back row, beside Rose. Next to John, Karkat shifted uncomfortably in his seat, and John glanced at him for half a second – their eyes met, before Karkat returned to scowling at the floor. The music had started up again, now in harsh contrast to Kanaya’s theme – it was lively, exciting, all major keys and slamming chords that made John’s heart jump.

Eridan. Of course it was Eridan; he strutted down the aisle like he owned the place, holding out his long, slender arms for the applause he knew he deserved. Tonight he wore a simple tuxedo but John was sure it wouldn’t stay on for long – and true to his estimation, within thirty seconds Eridan had tossed his shirt and jacket into the crowd and turned on his heel, centre-stage, to fix them all with the most catty lustful look John had ever seen on his face. He still had on his bowtie.

“Not a bad-lookin’ bunch,” Eridan said, smirking as he flicked his yellow eyes about. A nervous string of laughter bubbled up from the crowd, and John grinned. “Now, some of you might already know me. Hell, might’ve even put your dick in me –” another laugh, and a rather noticeable huff from Sollux, “but just in case you’re unlucky enough to have no idea who I am, they call me Eridan.”

Now Eridan had locked his eyes on John, and John smirked up at his friend, doing his best to mask his shyness.

“Kanaya asked me here tonight to warm you all up,” Eridan drawled, slowly, languidly crossing the space before halting just in front of John. “Trouble is, I think some of you are already a little…” Now Eridan had leaned down, taken a hold of his tie, and was running it between his fingers with the most inexplicably sexual look on his face. “Hot under the collar?”

“You stop that,” John said to him, grinning even as he felt scarlet heat rushing up the sides of his neck. Karkat tensed beside him, and John felt like an asshole.

“Now, see, I think our dear Kanaya may have had it in mind for me to take all my clothes off for you tonight,” Eridan said as he dropped John’s tie, ignoring the wave of cheering and catcalling that followed. He ran his thumb down from his navel to his belt buckle, pressing the bare flesh, “But that’s predictable. Boring. Any old stiff can pay to see that, hint hint. No, what I’m more excited about is all of _you_.”

He had such incredible stage presence. Every pair of eyes in the room was fixed inextricably on gorgeous, perfect Eridan. And they loved him. Well, except for Karkat, whose eyes were notably narrowed. Eridan smirked down at him.

“So why don’t we play a game? And then maybe you’ll get me naked before the night is over, who knows,” Eridan said, grinning as he snatched Karkat’s empty beer bottle out of his hand. Karkat scowled at him, but Eridan had already turned his back and returned to centre-stage. “Put your hand up if you’ve ever been so embarrassed you wanted to die.”

At least half the crowd had their hands in the air, including the two begrudging trolls on either side of him. John joined in with the laughter, which only got louder when Eridan joined them, hand in the air as he snickered.

“We’ve all been there. And if you _haven’t_ ,” Eridan said, snipping the last word so that the laughs were cut short and everyone felt just-about-pleasantly-uneasy again, “There’s still time. Don’t know about you, but I got all night.” He set the bottle down on the floor. “Folks in the front row, how do you feel about truth or dare?”

A hush fell, interrupted only by a couple nervous gigglers.

“Good? Yes? Come on, consent is sexy, silence doesn’t mean _yes_ ,” Eridan said, and then turned his slitted eyes on them one by one. “You want to play, don’t you?”

Eventually, one brave soul spat out, “Yes!”, and Eridan looked much like a pleased cat, glowing. He toed the bottle, setting it spinning, and every single person in the front row sat on the edge of their seat, tense. It slowed. John swallowed nervously. Eventually it stopped, and he looked up to see that it was pointing at Tavros, who was blushing fiercely as Eridan sauntered over to him.

“Truth or dare, my handsome friend?” Eridan cooed softly, running his fingertips over the length of one of Tavros’ horns. John didn’t think that Eridan was evil, or anything, but he did worry briefly about what he might make Tavros do. He didn’t hear what Tavros said, but Eridan was nodding, grinning.

“Dare, you say? Alright. What if I told you that you could kiss any person in this room? Just say the name, Tavros, and I’ll bring ‘em over just for you. If they’re willin’, of course.”

Tavros beckoned Eridan down so that he could whisper in his ear, and John was grinning again, watching as Eridan’s smirk broadened.

“I can hardly believe what I’m hearin’ here, ladies and gents. Do we have a _Jade Harley_ with us tonight?”

Jade stood, bouncing on the balls of her feet and looking completely thrilled, and she squeezed her way over and between chairs to meet Eridan and take his arm.

“How about a round of applause for this lovely lady, hm?” Eridan said, and they didn’t need telling twice. Jade didn’t seem embarrassed in the slightest; actually, she looked delighted as she let Eridan lead her across the room. She bent down at the waist to press her lips against Tavros’ in a way that was chaste and platonic enough, but clearly more than Tavros had ever expected might happen – he’d gone bright red, and hid his face in his hands until long after Jade returned to her seat.

The bottle span again. This time, Dave, and he wanted truth.

“Dave Strider. How attractive would you rate yourself, on a scale a one to ten?”

“Eleven.”

“Predictable.”

Now Nepeta. A dare, to kiss someone of the same sex for five seconds. She and Kanaya shared a giggly and ridiculous kiss, and Rose watched on looking… intrigued. John’s unease grew, and he shifted in his seat. He had been safe up to now – it was only a matter of time, surely.

Once more the bottle was spun, and it landed on Aradia.

“What do you think your greatest asset is?”

Aradia smirked at him, and then rather conspicuously palmed her breasts.

“Couldn’t agree more, my dear. Personally I think that’s one a the great failin’s of male anatomy.”

“Quite right,” Aradia giggled back to him.

And then it stopped on Karkat and John’s heart leapt.

“I have so been lookin’ forward to _this_ ,” Eridan purred predatorily, swaying across the stage to place himself before Karkat, smirking down at his scowling friend, radiating pleasure and power. “Karkat Vantas. Truth or dare?”

“This is stupid,” Karkat said, and the audience protested.

“Hey, I saw you laughin’ before – John, wasn’t he laughin’?” John nodded. “See? Now come on, don’t be a big baby.”

“Fine. Truth. But this is still stupid.”

“Truth. Think you’re gettin’ off easy, with truth?” Eridan said, leaning down so that he was eye-to-eye with Karkat, his eyes bugging evilly. “Not so, Kar. Not so. Tell me, my shouty little friend, to whom did you lose your virginity?”

John’s eyes automatically flicked across the room to Dave, who looked impassive as ever – but his hand had tightened a little with Terezi’s in his lap.

“You already know that,” Karkat snapped, and Eridan chuckled.

“But everyone _else_ wants to know. Come on. Not embarrassed, are you?”

“Yes, actually, now that you mention it,” Karkat snarled, and a few people laughed.

“Kar, answer the question so we can all get on with our lives,” Eridan insisted, and Karkat sighed, pressing his fingers to his temples before looking up at Eridan, murderously.

“You. Okay. _You._ ”

John’s eyes widened and he whipped around so quickly in his seat that he nearly overbalanced it – he was just about to yell out in protest about this, this _thing_ that had _happened_ , before Eridan took the opportunity to make his lap into a comfortable seat. John gave a single squawk and then was silenced, and completely blocked from view.

“That’s right, it was me. And it was _magical_ , wasn’t it?” Eridan said, fluttering his eyelashes at Karkat, to laughter.

“It wasn’t completely terrible,” Karkat said with a shrug, and Eridan sank.

“You’re gonna break my cold, dead heart in two, mister,” Eridan said, dramatically stroking his chest.

And then he span the bottle again. John couldn’t quite escape the idea of Eridan fucking Karkat, even though it was becoming increasingly obvious to him that Eridan had in fact fucked _everyone_.

“Did he ever do you?” John said quietly, into Sollux’s ear.

“Nope.”

The bottle then stopped on John, cutting their conversation short.

“Well if it isn’t my favourite human,” Eridan said, flicking his wicked stare in John’s direction. John shrank in his seat, completely not prepared for whatever horrors were about to unfold. “No need to look so scared, John. I’m innocent, see?”

“No,” John replied, but he grinned all the same as Eridan sauntered over to him, stopping with hands on hips.

“Truth or dare?”

He wasn’t particularly up for kissing anyone, and that seemed to be Eridan’s favourite flavour of dare – it was like he was some kind of matchmaker, and that struck John as particularly cute, but he didn’t really want anything to happen tonight.

“Truth.”

“Truth! I got the perfect one saved up just for you, John,” Eridan said. “I have it on good authority that before we met you, you never masturbated.”

John felt the heat rush to his face as the audience jeered – good-naturedly, he guessed, but it was still _so embarrassing_.

“Now, John, I would find it extremely difficult to believe that you could continue to be so, ah, so innocent and virtuous, after meetin’ _this_ ,” Eridan went on, exaggeratedly gesturing at his own lithe and lust-worthy body. “So tell me. When was the last time you touched yourself?”

John cringed, winced, bit his lip, and eventually spat out, “Last night, it was last night, okay.”

Mercifully, Eridan left it there, and John pointedly ignored Karkat’s stare, burning deeper crimson as the seconds passed. He hadn’t meant for it to happen! He had just been thinking, and then one thing had led to another, and… if he wanted Karkat to touch him like that then did that mean he had a crush? Or was he just confused? If he wanted Karkat to kiss him like Eridan had then… then what?

He was so caught up in everything that he didn’t even notice Kanaya booting Eridan off the stage because the bottle had landed on Sollux and Eridan had been getting just a little bit over-friendly.

John didn’t want to confront these feelings. But they were working their way to the front of his brain faster than he could run from them.

* * *

The show had ended an hour or two ago. John had agreed to stay for drinks. Everyone had gone home. For some reason Karkat always hung around until the last possible moment, until they reached the awkward point where there was no excuse not to leave, and yet.

“Go home, John. You’re drunk,” Karkat rasped at him, from the next barstool.

“Not that drunk,” John said, from his position cheek-down in something sticky on the bar. Most of the candles by now had puttered out, leaving just a few casting a warm chocolate light that danced and moved with breaths.

“You have work tomorrow.”

“Don’t.”

“You can’t stay here all night.”

He didn’t have to go. He didn’t need his bed.

“When are you leaving?” John said, lifting his head just enough to sip the last drop of his shot that he’d been nursing for the last twenty minutes.

“Soon. Once your stupid ass gets out of here,” Karkat snapped, and John winced against the buzz of his angry voice.

“You slept with _Eridan_ ,” John reminded him, for the umpteenth time that night, and Karkat’s palm met his forehead.

“That was one time! It was a mistake –”

“And you slept with Dave!”

“I have no regrets as far as that is concerned,” Karkat said, and then sighed. “Come on. I’m going home.”

“Can I come?” he suddenly said, and the words came out bright and unseemly and awkward.

“You – what? With me?”

“Yeah,” John said, fixing his stare on Karkat, who had stood and was halfway through shrugging on his jacket, blinking moony, confused eyes down at him.

“Uh, sure, but you’re not – I mean – you’re sleeping on the floor,” Karkat said, regaining his composure and smirking dismissively.

“Obviously. I didn’t think – I didn’t want – uh, actually, maybe I –”

“John, shut up,” Karkat said, grabbing him under the arms and levering him out of his stool, and out of the bar.

* * *

Now he was lying belly-up on Karkat’s bedroom floor. It was dark, lit by a slit between the curtains, and it smelled a little like that gross stuff that Gamzee smoked, but mostly like Karkat, which was a smell that warmed his chest and made him want. _Want_. But he needed Karkat for something else. He needed to talk to him about quadrants and Eridan. Mostly Eridan. And kissing. Karkat hadn’t yet started snoring, just taking snuffly breaths and turning occasionally with an unhappy sound. John wanted to crawl into bed next to him and kiss him all over with his wine-stained mouth, but he couldn’t. So instead he spoke.

“Karkat?”

“Oh my fuck, I am trying to _sleep_ , what do you _want_ ,” Karkat prattled back, his rage dampened and softened by how sleepy he was so that he put John in mind of a grumpy growling puppy.

“I was wondering if we could talk about Eridan?”

“I told you it was one time –”

“No, no, I don’t mean you! I mean, uh, me.”

A shuffling of sheets, as Karkat rolled onto his side and stared down at him.

“You, what, you slept with Eridan?”

“No! He kissed me and now I don’t know what to do,” John said, and sighed. This was stupid. He didn’t want Eridan like that.

“You like him, then?” Karkat said, and then snarled a little, because he’d obviously caught the tiny note of worry in his own voice.

“He’s Eridan, of course I like him, but I don’t want anything like… that. Not with him.”

“Tell me what actually happened.” Karkat sounded almost apprehensive, like he didn’t really want to know.

“I bumped into him on my way back home the other night. He, um, asked if you and me were a – a thing, you know, so I told him no, and then he kissed me,” John said, and Karkat was silent. “But I made him stop because I remembered what you said about Sollux, and then he started to, uh, to cry, so I tried comforting him. And that is what happened.”

“Did he say anything about Sollux?”

“Yeah. Yeah, he said that he liked him. A lot. But that he didn’t think Sollux would ever want him because –”

“Eridan thinks he’s damaged goods, John. He thinks no one would ever want him, not just because he sleeps with people for money but mostly because his self-esteem’s so shitty. That’s how I ended up sleeping with him in the first place. I was trying to comfort him and it ended up being… red. Really red. But just for one night.”

“You sound sad?”

“No. Not sad.” It was killing John that he couldn’t read Karkat’s face in this dim light. “He needed a moirail, but I have Gamzee.”

“Moirail? Is that the pale thing? That’s what he wanted me to do.”

“Do you even understand what it means to be someone’s moirail, John?”

“Kind of? Like, you’re their best friend and you look after them when they’re sad or whatever, right?”

“You’re responsible for keeping them under control. Eridan has a tendency to break people’s hearts. And his own in the process. If you want to be his moirail you’d end up being an agony aunt more than anything else.”

“I really wanted to say yes at the time, but I was afraid I wouldn’t know what to do,” John said, and then sighed. “Do you think I would be good enough, Karkat?”

“I think you would do just fine. It’d make him happy, either way, he’s desperate to fill his quadrants,” Karkat said, followed by a snort.

“Really?”

“Yeah, sure.”

“That’s great! Wow, thanks, Karkat. You’re such a good friend!”

Friend.

A moments’ silence passed.

“Whatever, Egbert. Glad I could help. Now go the fuck to sleep.”

… _Friend?_


	10. I Wish That I Could Make This Right

**Notes for the Chapter:**

>  **Trigger warning:** Reference to arson, reference to (threatened) rape, implied heavy violence and gore, murder

Nobody had heard from Karkat in over a week. That was fine, they told him, because sometimes he just disappeared for a little while, and he always came back before they could miss him too much. Sometimes he just got too angry or tired of seeing the same old faces for too long, they guessed, and so he’d shirk them for a while. Last time, he came back with letters from an old relative, so maybe he was soul-searching again, or just trying to catch a break from all the drama. Maybe the sight of Eridan was making him sick. Maybe he was studying, or something.

The fact was that nobody knew for _sure_ where Karkat had gone, and while John loved nothing more than to sit around shooting the shit with whoever happened to be in the Living Room at the time, it wasn’t quite the same without knowing that Karkat was around, quietly (or otherwise) observing him, laughing at him, paying him some attention. He didn’t have a reason to act out. Kanaya had told him twice already this week that he was acting strangely.

Anyway, the point was that he had only come to visit Karkat to check up on him. He had literally no other reason, honest. And okay, maybe he was wearing an outfit that Kanaya had advised him on, but that didn’t mean anything. She had been right, too – a blue and turquoise checked shirt to accent the blue of his eyes, which she kept telling him was _dazzling_ , buttoned up to the top and tucked into black jeans, his usual boots and, of course, Karkat’s plain black hoodie with the zip. In one hand he held a copy of _The Accidental Lovechild_ which was the latest best-selling trashy romance novel in the Upper City, and Karkat would love it for sure. He pushed the button for Karkat’s apartment and waited, standing back to look up at his building.

It was crammed in between two others on a street that was surely over-filled with houses, spilling over at the street corners so that the pavement had to weave onto the road to squeeze around them. Compared to the others on his street, Karkat’s apartment was respectable-looking enough – the windows were pretty clean and the curtains were shamelessly open. There were even windowboxes, growing fat, juicy lilies whose perfumed heads hung over the edges of their pots. John presumed Kanaya had something to do with that, and he was just starting to entertain the idea of her schooling him on how to keep flowers when the door opened.

“Woah,” he and Karkat said at the same time.

Karkat didn’t look great, but he didn’t look terrible, either. It was like he’d slipped down a few rungs on the ladder from okay, because he looked washed-out and less dewy than usual; his cheeks were probably sandpaper to the touch and his sunken eyes were swollen and more heavily-painted with bags than John had seen them before. Tiny threads of cherry red painted the yellows of his eyes. And his hair was getting long, John suddenly noticed; it was now a messy dark puff whose volume shadowed his candycorn horns from view and hung down into his eyes. Also, he was wearing boxers and a t-shirt, which John could only find entertaining. Of course he was the type to answer the door in his underpants.

“Hey,” John said, which seemed pretty inadequate. “Where have you been, huh?”

“Around,” Karkat crowed back, shrugging. “You wanna come inside?”

“Sure thing,” John chirped sunnily.

He followed Karkat up the stairs and through the door into his cramped, cosy little apartment, which he was already familiar with. He took a seat down on Karkat’s threadbare sofa, much to the chagrin of his host.

“Brought you a present,” John said, flashing the cover of the trashy book before laying it down on the coffee table. Karkat glanced at it before throwing himself into the corner of the couch, smirking.

“Decent choice, Egbert,” he rasped, and then grinned proper, showing all those millions of teeth. “Now what are you doing here?”

“I came to check up on you,” John said, resisting the urge to add _dummy_. “Are you okay?”

Karkat pulled a face for a fraction of a second, lips slanting under his cute button nose. He looked awfully small tonight, dusty in the dull light and all snug in the corner of his sofa. John wanted to close the space between them, really, really bad. He wanted his hands around Karkat’s shoulders or cupping that dry cheek. He wanted their lips to touch but instead he got two feet of stagnant air and a weary bloodshot look.

“I went to get my hair cut,” Karkat said, which did not really answer the question. John quirked a brow at him and his over-long mane.

“What happened?” John pushed, because Karkat wasn’t going to give anything up easy.

“Well I went to my usual place. They give me a discount because I patch up their kids’ bloody knees from time to time,” Karkat said, smiling a little. But it was a distant kind of smile, and only for a moment, before his face twisted again. “I got there and the place was gone. Just fucking _gone_ , John. Burned to the ground.”

John’s stomach dropped.

“Did anyone…?” _Die?_

“The kids,” Karkat eventually spat out. “The kids, they died.”

“Oh my god,” John murmured, and now Karkat was staring at the sofa cushion, tuning him out. “And humans… humans did that?”

Karkat nodded, once. John wanted to punch someone. Or shoot them. Maybe that last thing. Red anger must’ve started flooding his cheeks because now Karkat’s eyes were glittering as he stared across at him.

“You’re shaking,” Karkat observed, and John frowned, furious.

“Of course I’m shaking, Karkat, this is disgusting!” he yelled, and then ran a hand through his hair. “Sorry. Sorry – yelling at you isn’t going to change anything.”

“It’s fine,” Karkat said, and then a pause, and, “I’m getting used to being yelled at.” He gave half a laugh.

“By who?”

“Dave. Eridan. I told myself I was done with teen drama but clearly they had other ideas,” he said, rolling his eyes. 

“Why? What did they say?” John pried, leaning forward now to peer at Karkat over his glasses. Karkat smirked.

“Drop it, Egbert. It’s sensitive information.”

Laughing, John insisted, “That’s not fair! You can’t dangle stuff like that in front of me then refuse to give it up!”

“I can do whatever I want in my own home, John,” Karkat snipped back, grinning evilly, and John was defeated.

After a moments’ pause, John said, “Hey, I can cut your hair for you.”

Karkat actually snapped “What?” before he realised what John had just offered him, and then he leaned away from him, eyeing him cautiously. “Are you qualified to do that?”

“Sure! I used to cut my dad’s hair,” he said, with a little chuckle, “And sometimes I cut Dave’s, when he’s not being too much of a cool kid to let his pal cut his hair.”

After a moments’ consideration, Karkat said, “Okay, sure, but if you fuck it up, I’m going to shave you bald.”

“Deal.”

* * *

Now Karkat sat on a stool in the middle of his tiny, dingy kitchen, flanked by John who held a comb and was slowly trying to build up the courage to touch that fluffy mass again. Karkat lifted his chin, jutting it challengingly up at John, and John tutted and tapped the back of his head so that Karkat held it level and forward again and a lump grew in John’s throat. Such soft hair. He pushed his fingers through the roots of Karkat’s hair, not managing to ignore the way Karkat’s shoulders hunched just a fraction when he dragged his fingertips over a sensitive spot.

“Am I actually going to get a haircut or are you just going to play with it all day?” Karkat snapped, and John resisted the urge to give him some suggestive reply.

“Sure,” he said instead, and Karkat humphed.

It was with a deft hand that John took the comb to the back of Karkat’s hair, gently teasing out the few knots that there were and smoothing it all down. Then the scissors, flicked out from his belt where he’d been keeping them; with a few choice snips he’d tamed the length at the nape of Karkat’s neck and now crested the crown of his head, trimming as he went so that soon, the back of Karkat’s hair was its usual medium-long and neat enough.

“Whoops,” he joked, and Karkat looked around so fast that John had to snatch the scissors away to make sure he didn’t get an eyeful of point.

“What? What did you do? John, what the _fuck_ did you do to my hair?” Karkat demanded, running his hands through the back of it to feel for the imaginary accident. John’s face split into a telling grin almost immediately, and Karkat scowled at him, before turning his back. “Ha fucking ha, Egbert.”

“I thought it was funny,” John said lightly, before setting to trimming the hair over Karkat’s ears. This meant cupping the shell of his ear with two fingers to make sure it didn’t get nicked with the scissors – Karkat gave a little grumpy huff at the touch but didn’t protest too much. John did the other ear, too, and they were about equal.

“Looks good so far,” John said.

“I’ll believe that when I see it.”

Now he had to tend to the top, which would probably be the hardest part. It looked pretty funny right now, actually, with the back and sides all neat and then an overgrown mass on the top, like he was some kind of extravagant bird. First John eyed his horns.

“I don’t need to watch out for those things or anything, do I?”

“The horns? They’re pretty sensitive.”

“Really?” John chuckled, and then thumbed the base of one. Karkat stiffened, and John felt weird excitement shooting up his spine. Against his better judgement, he circled its tip, adjusting the pressure so he was barely tickling it with the pad of his finger, and Karkat was still and electrified. “You like that?”

Karkat didn’t make a sound, although he was probably burning with rage or something. It was, after all, Karkat.

“Wish I’d known about this sooner, it sure seems to shut you up,” John said, and then snorted as Karkat threw his head forward.

“You just lost your horn-touching privilege, fuckass,” Karkat growled.

“But I was just getting started!” John whined. “Can I earn it back?”

Was this inappropriate? Was it… was it _flirting?_

“Doubtful. It’s something I reserve for my romantic interests, not my friends,” Karkat replied, without missing a beat. Something inside of John died a little bit because _it was his fault_.

“That’s a shame. Oh well,” John said, sounding as nonchalant as he could before Karkat leaned back again and let him start chopping the top layers of his tangle. He was careful around the horns, giving them as wide of a berth as possible, and to cut the fringe he had to circle Karkat and hunch down in front of him. They made awkward eye contact, gazes stuttering here and there, as snippets of Karkat’s hair tumbled to the floor between them.

After a few more minutes, John stood back, threw the scissors and comb down on the counter, and happily exclaimed “Done!”

He had then been dragged to the bathroom by a sceptical Karkat, who spent no less than fifteen minutes running his fingers through his hair this way and that, smoothing sections and layers and ruffling others until it looked, more or less, like the way he usually liked to wear it.

“I guess this will do,” Karkat said, smirking, and John rolled his eyes.

“You’re welcome.”

“Yeah, thanks. There’s one more thing.”

“What?”

Karkat ran his hands again through his choppily-cut hair, looking a little anxious again, eyes clouded. “Aradia said she would visit tonight. She should have been here an hour ago. It’s probably nothing, she can look after herself, but she was in the Upper City so –”

“Hey, don’t worry about it. I’ll keep an eye out on the way back, alright?” John said, and then, unable to resist, he placed a hand on Karkat’s shoulder. Much to his amazement, Karkat didn’t throw the hand away, but he looked conflicted.

“Thanks, Egbert.”

* * *

What John had said was that he would keep an eye out. What he _meant_ was that he wouldn’t rest until he’d combed every inch of the city twice, not just because he wanted to do a favour for perfect cranky little Karkat, but also because he loved Aradia, and if she needed his help then he needed to be there. He’d run back to his apartment and grabbed his guns, which were now holstered at his hips, and he stalked through shadowy alleys feeling as dangerous as he ever had. It had been an hour of searching by now and he was bristling with fear and rage at the thought that someone could have hurt their Aradia.

He felt like a piece of shit, though, that he also couldn’t stop thinking about Karkat and the way that pawing at his horns had turned him into a shivery mess, but still all angry and edgy, or how soft his mess of hair was under John’s fingers, or how he’d had too much pain already and John wanted to put Karkat in his arms and shoot down anyone who tried to hurt him or take him away. Eventually he was probably going to have to admit to all of these feelings – a conclusion he was not too happy about when he reached it, mid-step under a lamp.

There was no chance that Karkat might feel the same, though. Obviously. He’d had Dave, Eridan; both of them slick and perfect, handsome and enigmatic. And then there was him, a goofy bucktoothed loser and still more boring than any of the rest of them. Selfish, too – he suddenly remembered Aradia and, jaw tightening, he set off around the next street corner.

This narrow avenue led down the back of a row of townhouses in the Bazaar; pretty upmarket dwellings, the kind that the middle classes tended to occupy. They all looked the same, at least from behind, red brick with white windowframes and steep roofs edged with cast-iron fencing. He picked his way between trash cans, throwing his hardened stare this way and that. He was so intent on focusing his eyes in the dark that he barely heard the window opening above him.

But what he _did_ hear was a tiny voice whisper-yell, “ _John!_ ”

He threw his head back so fast that he cricked his neck, and then he caught sight of Aradia – or her hair, first, all of her ebony curls hanging down from the window. She’d stuck her head out and was staring down at him looking ashen and ghost-like, eyes wide. She was only a floor up, he could see her trembling, her white-knuckle grip on the windowsill, and the rosy bruise leeching across her collarbone.

“Aradia? What’s going on?!” he hissed urgently, eyebrows knitting.

“Get help! Don’t come in here alone –”

There was a sudden crash behind her, and a furious yell. She glanced back over her shoulder, long hair flying, and then urgently called back down to him.

“I can hold my own for a while, but _please_ –”

“Okay! I’ll be right back,” John said. “Aradia, be safe!”

“John, get _out_ of here,” Aradia snapped, and then slammed the window shut as John took off running. He wouldn’t think of her as a damsel in distress, because like she’d just said, she could hold her own. She just needed her friends to back her up, she needed John to follow her orders, and lucky for her, he was kind of good at that.

* * *

It had taken him less than ten minutes to sprint the distance to the Living Room and round up the few people who were hanging around – Jade, Eridan and Sollux – and now the four of them, together with a slavering alchemical wolf-beast, were tearing down the avenue, sending trash cans clanging to the ground in their wake as they closed the distance between them and the house John had seen Aradia in. He skidded to a halt, panting raggedly, and pointed at the back door of the building.

“She’s – in there –” John panted, his heart pounding in his skull. A white-hot poker of fear had penetrated his spine deep, and he jumped at the sound of Jade cocking her gun; he whipped around and she had a look on her face that he’d never seen before. Behind her huge glasses her snub features were twisted into a snarl that was murderous, to put it lightly.

Eridan and Sollux were each toting a pair of revolvers, much like John, and while Sollux seemed concerned enough, Eridan was wild with rage. A furious purple flush had risen like bruising in his neck, and was still climbing as he growled, “I’m gonna fuckin’ kill them.”

“Don’t be stupid!” Jade snapped, “You’ll go to prison!”

“You’re both jutht ath trigger-happy ath each other,” Sollux pointed out, and Eridan side-eyed him vehemently.

“Shut it, Sol,” Eridan snapped. “John, bust this fuckin’ thing open, I’m tired a waitin’.”

Not one to need an order repeating, John steadied himself and then booted the door once, twice, sending a painful recoil shooting up his shin but it was fine – on the third time it’d taken too much abuse and the top hinge broke, and with a final swift kick the door had clattered backwards into the hallway with a great splintering and puff of dust. Bec led the way, because Bec was by far the most intimidating of all of them; the dog hopped through the doorframe and they all followed him into the house.

It was luxurious inside, as John had expected; the hardwood floors were accented with rugs in deep jewel-rich tones and the walls were hung with paintings and embroidered curtains. Candles burned low in their wall-holders; the five of them cast long shadows as they picked their way through the hallway, following Bec whose paws fell with trepidation – the dog raised his wet nose to scent the air and then turned his great head, horns catching the light. He knew Aradia’s perfume well, and he could sniff her out.

Bec leaped the stairs four at a time; she was somewhere up there, near where John had last seen her. He felt sick. When he glanced back at Eridan, Sollux and Jade, the three of them had tight and worried faces, all squinting in the dim light – and then their noses all wrinkled as the stench of blood hit them like a brick.

“Fuck,” Eridan whispered, frowning, and John tried to put his horrified thoughts out of his mind as he followed Bec down the corridor. The dog’s three tails were all crowded between his legs and his ears had flattened down over his horns. He picked up his pace to a trot as the scent intensified, pervading John’s nostrils and settling a sickness in the base of his belly. His grip tightened on his guns, and they turned a corner.

A door was ajar. Bec whimpered noisily, a sudden whistle of a note that would doubtlessly have given them all away, and he bolted forward with a skitter of claws on wood, blustering through the door – John tried to throw himself on the beast to stop him but he was kicked off by Bec’s floundering hind legs and stumbled sideways into Eridan, who caught him in strong arms and dragged him into the room.

It was a bedroom, destroyed, tapestries torn from the walls and lying in strips, feathers from pillows scattered around the place and bedsheets ripped to slivers, vases shattered and dust still trickling from the ceiling, and red, red, red, painted redder than hearts, and there was a body, guns lying pointlessly at its side, but Aradia was huddled in the corner of the room, wearing red. Red on her cheeks, splattered on her shoulders. Reddish bloody knots in her hair; torn ribbons of that decorated the floor, too, and she held her hands at her temples and sobbed, and Eridan’s guns clattered to the floor as he darted forward faster than any of them could and collapsed on his knees at her side, wrapping his arms around her instantly, and she slumped into him, and finally took a breath.

And then, she exhaled.

“Looks like you weren’t needin’ our help, after all,” he said gently, glancing briefly at the crumpled body on the ground. John holstered his guns and crept anxiously forward. Now he could see there was blood under her nails, too, blood all the way up her bare arms.

“He told me that he was going to –”

An enormous breath, like it was the last one she might ever take and she wanted it to be worth the while.

“—hurt me, oh god, Eridan, I’m so sorry –”

Again, before they could speak, Eridan had shooshed her, petting her long tangle of curls, twirling the ends around his elegant fingers. The rest of them could only watch. Bec had crammed himself into their corner, wrapping himself like a huge white crescent around their embrace.

“What are you apologisin’ for, huh?” Eridan said, with gentleness in his voice that John had _never_ heard. “He got what was comin’ to him, see? He didn’t hurt you, did he?”

“He hit me, once,” Aradia said, and then took a shuddering breath, “I didn’t mean to kill him – John, what’s going to happen to me?”

Suddenly all eyes were on him, and John swallowed the lump in his throat. It went down like sandpaper. He knew what was going to happen, obviously. She, a troll, and the man she’d killed, a human – she would be executed by the Tribunal without trial.

“He – he – he was a client – that’s illegal too, that’s – maybe they’ll let me off maybe they won’t please don’t let them please I don’t want to die,” her words spilled out, staggering; she tried to pull away from Eridan but he wasn’t going to let her go, and then John understood. He was as good as a big brother to her and she meant the world to him, and here she was in the worst trouble for doing what any of them might’ve done, and there was no way out.

“Nothing’s going to happen to you, Aradia,” Jade said, stepping forward and leaving Sollux standing awkwardly on his own. He came to stand next to John, adjusting his goggles for want of something to do with his hands, and the pair of them peered down on Eridan, Aradia and Jade, hovering near Bec’s giant hindpaws. Jade hunkered down beside Eridan, pushing a wave of Aradia’s hair out of her face so that she could meet those huge sunny eyes, now wet with fear.

“They’re going to find out what I did,” Aradia whispered, almost imperceptibly.

“No. You’re going to get out of here, okay? They’ll take you back safe,” Jade said, tilting her head in the others’ direction. “I’m going to stay here and sort everything out.”

“Jade, the fuck do you think you’re doin’?” Eridan said, his voice cracking in fear.

“Jade, no,” Aradia said, hoarse. “I don’t want – I’m not – I would rather die than for you to –”

“For me to what? Spend some time in prison? I’m not scared of that! And I’m not going to take no for an answer!”

“You’ll probably get a life sentence,” John said, eyes slipping shut at the thought. He screwed his eyelids together and his temples throbbed as he said, “But at least they won’t kill you.”

“See?” Jade said, her hand joining Eridan’s in Aradia’s hair. “It’s going to be alright, Aradia. This isn’t your fault.”

“I killed him!” Aradia wheezed in between Jade’s collarbones.

“You were defendin’ yourself, darlin’,” Eridan said into her hair, stroking her ear now. Her breathing at least had slowed.

“What are you going to do, Jade?” Aradia murmured, and John and Sollux shared a worried glance.

“I brought some potions and things,” Jade said, petting the messenger bag slung from her shoulder, “I’ll remove any trace that you were here. Fill this room with evidence that points to me. They’ll never know any of you were even here.”

There was a pause, in which the only discernible sound was Bec’s whimper-accented breathing.

Eventually, Aradia said, “Are you sure?”

“I’m so sure!” Jade insisted, “I would do anything for you, Aradia! You know I love you.”

“I love you too,” Aradia said, looking up at her friend with heartbreak in her eyes.

“So don’t worry. You all need to get out of here, now!” Jade said. “Bec, be a good dog and stay with Aradia.”

Bec was on his feet in half a second, electrified by responsibility. Aradia braced herself on his strong body and in Eridan’s arms as she stood, and flanked by a big white dog, Sollux, John, Eridan and Aradia left the room. The last thing they heard as they started down the stairs was a clink and a fizz, as Jade set her alchemy to work.

* * *

The door to Karkat’s building was unlocked when John showed up. He knocked once on the apartment door.

“John! Did you find – John? Holy shit – hey, it’s okay.”

Karkat had dragged him, staggering, over to the sofa, where he was set down in a corner. For once, Karkat sat next to him. There was a feeling John wasn’t sure he could remember the name of, when the edge of Karkat’s shoulder pressed into his chest. And then again when stubby fingers scrubbed at the stubborn bloodstains on his jaw, painted on his shirt.

“What happened? Did you find Aradia? Fuck, is she –”

“Not dead,” John croaked, and then he took his glasses off and threw them down on the coffee table. He was done. It was four something in the morning. “She…”

His voice cracked and trailed off, but John didn’t break. He was a brick wall, in physique and mentality. Lamplighters didn’t fracture and fall. They were built to stand steadfast and strong.

“She got abducted by a client. I found her, in his house in the Bazaar. She told me to go back and get help. By the time we returned she had already murdered him. With her bare hands,” John listed off, his voice a stumbling staccato.

“Shit,” Karkat punctuated.

“Jade stayed. Jade said she would tamper with the crime scene to make it look like –” John said, and then took a deep breath in.

And then out.

Aradia would be okay. Jade would be okay. They would all live through this.

“– she did it. Because the Tribunal would kill Aradia as soon as they caught up to her. Which they always do.”

Karkat was lost for words, which was so completely unlike him that in another universe, where everything was fine, John would have been cracking up. Big wet eyes were fixed on him unshakeably, distant misty lights in the darkness like the comfort of the moon over an unnavigable ocean. John thought a part of him might have collapsed tonight. Jade was leaving them and Aradia had splintered too.

“John, I.”

“It’s okay,” John found himself saying, and then he found his arm circling Karkat’s shoulders, and he found himself shifting his weight and leaning to lay his head on the armrest, and quite suddenly he _found_ himself there, with Karkat in his arms, with that concerned lamplit grey face an inch away from his, and he found himself more exhausted than he’d ever been, and for all the world he wanted to kiss this tiny perfect man, but his brain was lead and his eyelids too heavy.

“Yeah,” Karkat eventually croaked. “It’s okay.”

There were fingers in his hair, hard little nails dragging the curve of his scalp, and if only there were another timeline, a parallel existence, a happier place where the lamps always glowed golden.

“I wanted to help you so much,” John said, and Karkat nodded, still running fingers down to the nape of his neck. “I thought I could.”

“Are you giving up, John?”

“Not ever,” he murmured back, instantly.

That was where he fell asleep that night.

That was the night he knew that there was nothing he could do, any more, to overturn this. They could not fight the system. But they could hold and help each other through the bad times. And the bad times had only just begun.

That was the night he realised that Karkat was probably the one, whatever that meant, and their sand timer was running out.


	11. Lately I'm Not Dreaming

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Happy Valentine's Day! Have some JohnKat hurt/comfort.
> 
> Also, seeing as it's the day for it, I would just like to say that if you're reading this, I LOVE YOU, and I really really hope you're having as much fun as I am with Lamplit!

“John?”

Karkat’s voice was small, a quiet rasp that rocked John gently out of sleep. He had a hand on Karkat’s hip and they were face-to-face, having snatched each other closer in their dreams for comfort or for… for some other reason, some reason that terrified him. John opened his eyes to find that the room was darker than it had been before, now lit by a single window letting in a spread of emerald light from the lantern over the bar opposite Karkat’s apartment. By now all the patrons had gone home. It was so very, very quiet that he could almost hear the lamps buzzing under the steady sound of Karkat’s breathing.

The air did not move but the heat between them did as they shifted to squash it, cutting inches off the space. Closer. Closer was definitely better. Karkat’s hand lay, incriminated, just under John’s ear. It was like he’d left it there by accident and to move it now would only draw attention to it.

“What’s the matter?” John gruffed hoarsely, focusing his bleary eyes on yellow.

“What are they going to do to Jade?”

He had forgotten. He realised that he had forgotten. And suddenly everything rushed back and shattered that peaceful sleepy illusion that their life was not a fragile thing, that their limbs entangled on the sofa in the middle of the night could mean something. That any of this had a point or that there was a reason to keep the lamps burning. That Jade would be safe, and they would all die old.

“She’ll get a trial, but she’ll probably plead guilty. They’ll put her in the Bastille,” he said quietly, no longer meeting Karkat’s eyes.

“For how long?”

“She’s a troll sympathiser.”

“So how long?”

“For… for a long time.”

Karkat wilted a little, barbs all melting away and tension dissolving into nothing as he sank into the cushions with a defeated sigh, a puff of warm breath against John’s cheek. He was the most beautiful and improbable thing John had ever seen. In spite of it all.

“You need to go to work,” Karkat said into the armrest, “Make sure they don’t hurt her.”

He shouldn’t have gone to sleep at all. He should have laid there to drink in the warm and the quiet and he should have watched Karkat sleep while he still could, catch those precious moments where Karkat was at peace, because now the rise and fall of his chest was a tight and scared thing and his mouth was fixed in that constant frown and wrinkles worried the corners of his big eyes. Maybe one day he could make it happen. Maybe one day he could ease out the tension.

Then another part of his brain started hammering on his line of thought and reminded him of _Jade,_ that she needed him now, and he loved her, and his crush on Karkat could wait. Even though the one thing they would never have for all the world was time.

“I know. Karkat, I’ve known her since we were three years old. She’s my sister practically! I’ll look after her,” John said.

“Fuck, I should’ve realised – I’m sorry, John,” Karkat crackled back, groaning as he took back his hand from John’s ear to push it through his own tousled hair.

John checked his watch. He’d been asleep for an hour and a half. Work started in less than an hour.

“Listen, I had better go. I’ll see you later,” he said, looking Karkat for one last time in the eyes, watching how those scarlet irises thinned as Karkat fixed him with a bloody stare. His pupils were dilating. That meant… oh, what did it mean? It meant he was drinking in the dim light. It didn’t mean anything.

“You’d better,” was all Karkat said. John hesitated before he left, pausing for a blank moment that should’ve, could’ve been filled with a kiss, but instead he just breathed, smiled awkwardly, and pushed himself up off the cushions and towards the door.

It was on his way down the staircase that John realised all the things he should have said.

* * *

John’s boss’ nose wrinkled the second John walked through his office door, and all John could do in reponse was shoot him what he hoped was a winning grin, and quietly pray that he’d managed to get most of his five-o’-clock shadow gone. He hadn’t had very long to get ready for work after he’d left Karkat’s. One of his jacket lapels was bent out of shape and he had yet to shower, but surely he couldn’t have smelled so bad that his boss could scent him across the room. He found himself blushing as he clicked shut the door.

“You called for me, sir?” he said, clasping his hands in front of him as he crossed the room to stand meekly in front of his boss’ desk. The Chief Commissioner leaned forward with a creak of his chair and skewered John with the most distrusting stare John had seen on anyone’s face for a long time.

“Yes, boy. Why is it that. You stink so much of troll,” English said gruffly, looking John up and down once. John smoothed down the lapel of his jacket, effortlessly keeping his cool.

Secret agent and everything.

“Oh, it’s just this cologne I found in a box of my dad’s old stuff,” he said, lying as naturally as anything, stuttering a tiny bit and giving his boss this huge apologetic grin. “I thought it wasn’t so bad… I didn’t realise, heh.”

His boss knew perfectly well what had happened to his dad, and so he dropped the subject almost instantly with a shrug and a brusque growl of, “My mistake.”

“What can I do for you, boss?” John said, now adjusting his glasses and looking keen. His insides glowed with warmth at the fact that he must’ve smelled of Karkat, that strong and musky and enticing smell that put him in mind of late nights and staggering home. He was so pleased with himself that he almost missed what English did next.

There was a drawing laid out on the table now, and he recognised the portrait instantly as Jade. They hadn’t rendered her particularly flatteringly – he knew that she was a lot more beautiful than that, and she didn’t look anywhere near as much of a dullard as she had been depicted. His brow furrowed, but he could play that off as any number of things.

“You know this woman.”

“Yes, it’s Jade Harley. Why do you ask, sir? Has something happened?” John said, looking up from the picture of Jade that was making him angry to meet his boss’ eyes.

“She is implicated in a murder investigation. We need to detain her. I felt that you would know her whereabouts.”

“I – I think I could probably find her,” John spat out, his voice just a little strangled. He knew they were going to arrest Jade but he didn’t realise he would be the one to do it; then he remembered what Karkat had said, imploring him to make sure no-one would hurt her, and he was right. This way was the best it could’ve been.

“Good. Egbert. You are often reliable,” his boss said, his slanted line of a mouth curving just a fraction at one end. John didn’t laugh, but he wanted to, because he was the most unreliable Lamplighter around! He was pretty sure none of the rest of them were like him.

“Of course, sir. I’ll be back as soon as possible.”

“Dismissed.”

* * *

It hadn’t surprised him that the Lamplighters had caught up to Jade so quickly. They were an institution characterised by dogged ruthlessness and a feverish obsession with upholding the law, and really, anyone would be a fool to think that they could outrun them. Jade obviously knew that she couldn’t because when he got to the Living Room – knocking first, because this time he came as an uninvited guest rather than a friend – she was already there, waiting for him. There was no other option. There was no choice. If the law were coming for you, where was there to run? Into the darkness? Death would be better than whatever was out there.

“Hello, John,” Jade said, swinging open the front door so that he could duck in under the cramped doorframe. “They took longer to find me out than I’d thought!”

“Really? The boss seemed pleased with himself,” John said, smirking as he swung the door shut behind the two of them. Now they stood in the darkened entrance of the bar, at the top of the staircase that led down to the place that they both so loved.

“No one else is around,” Jade sighed, smoothing back a lock of her hair behind her ear. “All asleep, I hope.”

“Yeah, I hope so, too,” John said, running a hand through his hair as he thought of Karkat. “Jade, are you sure you want to do this?”

Laughing at him, as she and Rose often had when they were growing up together, Jade said, “Of course I am, John! I already made my decision, and I don’t think even you could help me now, anyway.”

John’s jaw tightened, and he shook his head. “No. No, probably not.”

“But, John, listen. You have to look after everyone. I know you will anyway but I feel like everything’s going to get worse from now on, you know? And they need all the help they can get,” Jade said, fixing him with her deep and imploring green eyes, glasses catching the dull honey light. John couldn’t help but wonder why she wasn’t crying, because if it had been him who was facing life imprisonment he would’ve been crumbling. “Especially look after Aradia, okay?”

“Yeah, I know. I’ll protect them as much as I can,” John said, flicking his stare to one of his guns. Eventually there would be a time that he’d have to use them against another person, and if everything was rushing so quickly to its conclusion then maybe that day was coming sooner than any of them could’ve predicted.

“Oh, and another thing! Make sure Bec gets fed and walked. He’ll get lonely,” Jade said, with a little sigh.

“I’ll make sure. Don’t worry about a thing, Jade.”

They smiled at each other, the kind of broken aching smile that tugs the lips once there’s nothing left, once the knowledge sets in that every battle has been lost and the dust is clearing over the only option left. Jade was going to the Bastille, and people didn’t get out of the Bastille. There were no visitor hours. Jade would never see any of them again; John could get away with visits every month or so, pretending that he was there on Lamplighter business, but that was it. She would be gone without a trace.

“I’ll try not to,” she eventually said, and then looked away as she dabbed at the corners of her eyes with her fingertips. “I didn’t want to say goodbye, you know, because I thought I wouldn’t be able to leave. I even made Bec stay with Eridan, they’re probably driving each other crazy.”

They both laughed, and that was enough to spill proper tears from Jade’s eyes, and John wrapped his arms around her and squeezed her tight just like the big brother he was supposed to be. She buried her face into his neck, marking it with a warm trickle. He hadn’t held her like this in years; the last time, they’d been eleven, and it had been because some kid had called her ugly and said that nobody liked her.

“I love you, Jade.”

How things had changed.

“I love you too, big brother.”

It didn’t matter that they weren’t blood relatives. In fact that was completely irrelevant. They’d been together for some twenty years. They’d grown up together. And not even this was going to tear them apart. Nothing could split them up for good.

As gently as he could, John swayed from side to side so that he could rock her, like she was that scared and sad little girl again. It was enough to stay her tears for a minute, and that was plenty of time for her to force herself back together; she pulled away from him, wiping her cheeks with her sleeve and smiling bravely.

“We should go,” she sniffed. “They’re waiting for you, right?”

“Yeah,” John said, and then they both glanced at the handcuffs hanging from his belt.

“Do I get to wear those?” she said, sounding eager.

“People don’t usually sound so excited about it,” John said, snorting. “You can wear them if you want.”

“It’ll be like cops and robbers! Go ahead, officer,” she snickered wickedly, and, rolling his eyes, John freed the cuffs from his belt and fastened them around her wrists.

“I have to say this thing now,” John said, and Jade nodded. “Okay. You are under arrest on suspicion of murder. You have the right to remain silent, but it may harm your defence if you do not mention, when questioned, something which you later rely on in court. Anything you do say may be given in evidence.”

“It just doesn’t sound that impressive coming from you, you know?” Jade giggled, and John quirked his brows.

“Why not?”

“You’re not threatening at all! You’re like a big puppy or something,” she said, and John grinned, mortified.

“Thanks, Jade. Come on… let’s go.”

“Wait, John, will you stay with me once we get there?”

“I will stay as long as I can. I swear.”

“Okay. Hold my hand.”

John grabbed one of her hands; it was tiny and felt soft under his calluses. She smiled at him once more and let him lead her out of the cool, dark room and onto the incandescent streets of the Lower City. This early in the morning, town was completely silent, and all the curtains were drawn shut. It was so quiet and it didn’t take long for the sadness to set in again.

“Gosh, it’s beautiful here, isn’t it?” Jade said, looking this way and that, and John followed her stare as they passed through the streets, under ribbons of entangled light, a hundred different shades that lit up puddles at the roadside and painted the pavement yellow. The street corners shadowed navy at the edges, and the air was humming with lamp buzz, and the whole cosy tangle was crested by ribbons of smoke and steam puffing on their own eddying currents, floating over the jade roofs and spilling into alleyways.

“Yeah. Yeah, it’s beautiful.”

In recent weeks the city had looked more like a wounded animal than the majestic jewel it had once been. Even though they’d closed off as much of the barricade as they could, a few people knew their way in from the outside, and some who filtered through were no friends to them. Shells and scales of bottle-green broken glass anointed the sidewalk like perverse confetti; every now and then they’d pass a building with some marking sprayed on it, an ugly, dripping wound. Sometimes they could see where someone had tried to scrub it away, but mostly the trolls were giving up. Windows were smashed. Buildings were soot-stained and the streets were ash-strewn; they passed what John guessed was Karkat’s barber’s, now just a blackened, spindly skeleton, with a single bouquet of flowers laid where the doorframe once had stood. Lilies. John gripped Jade’s hand a little tighter.

“I just thought of something,” Jade said, from next to him where they’d paused in front of the gutted building.

“What is it?”

“Make sure you look after yourself, too, okay?”

John ducked his head.

“I’ll be f—”

“John! Don’t pretend like you’re fine when you’re not!”

He felt heat rush to his ears. He wasn’t the type to ever admit that anything was wrong. He was a rock, a shoulder to cry on, and he never needed comforting. Jade huffed the sour air and frowned at him, the colour rising in her cheeks.

“They’re going to want to help you too, John. Just don’t push them away when they do, okay?”

“Why would they want to help me?” John said, brow furrowed. 

“Because you did so much for us. Because… because you need them too. You know you do! Think about Karkat.”

“Karkat? He doesn’t care about me,” John snorted, lip curling at how ridiculous that notion was.

“You’re so stupid!” Jade snapped, actually stamping her foot. “Of course he cares about you! He just has a weird way of showing it.”

“Weird? I think that’s kind of an understatement.”

“Whatever. The point is, both of you have moirails that you have to look after, right? But nobody’s looking after either of you! And I really think he wants you to be closer, John.”

John frowned. On the one hand, he wasn’t totally convinced by what Jade was saying to him. On the other hand, Karkat had been astonishingly tender with him last night, and anyway, John was in absolutely no position to deny Jade one of her last requests. He trusted her, too. She’d always had this knack for seeing the bigger picture, almost like she knew what was coming. It was uncanny, sometimes.

“I think that’s what you want, too,” Jade said, staring at him. When he tried to look away, she grabbed his chin in her cuffed hands and forced him to look her in the eye. “Isn’t it?”

“I really like him, Jade,” John murmured, wincing. “It’s so dumb.”

“Um, what do you mean by like?”

“I can’t believe we’re actually having this discussion right now.”

“Answer the question!”

She still had a hold of his chin and scowl as he might, she wasn’t going to let go.

“I have a crush on him, okay! A big stupid crush!” John huffed, and then took her by the wrists – gently – and lowered her arms.

“Does he know?”

“No! I’m never going to tell him, that would be ridiculous.”

“John… what if you run out of time and he never finds out?”

“It’ll be fine. He doesn’t feel the same way, so –”

“John Egbert, you are the biggest idiot I have ever met! What does it matter if he doesn’t feel the same way?! He deserves to know!” Jade ranted, jabbing him in the chest with her two pointer fingers. “You don’t have to do it today, or tomorrow, but John, promise me you’ll tell him. Before it winds up being too late.”

They stared at each other for several long moments, Jade’s huge green eyes scanning over the slant of his mouth, the apprehensive crinkle of his eyes. How was he supposed to say no? But if he agreed, his conscience would carry it through, and it _would_ happen, and he would ruin everything.

And yet. She was right.

“Okay. Okay, I promise, I will.”

“Good! And then when you’re having sloppy makeouts with him you can think of me! Um, not in a weird way or anything. Actually, forget I said that!”

John snorted, and then flushed scarlet and, cackling, Jade let John lead her off down the street.

* * *

“Miss Jade Harley. You are a suspect in the murder of Lord Anthony Langley. An incident that occurred last night. At approximately eleven thirty p.m.”

They’d brought in John’s boss to interrogate Jade, which at first had seemed like an overreaction, but after John had flipped through the case file for about five minutes in the break room he had understood why. The man who Aradia had killed was an extremely rich, well-respected benefactor of the government, a personal friend of the family of the mayor, and the heir to a big printing business. He had also been an eligible bachelor, and apparently was known for sleeping around. Clearly he’d grown tired of the usual ‘fare’ and decided to plump for something more exotic, in the form of Aradia. It made John sick to his stomach. Women weren’t _things_. He probably hadn’t been expecting Aradia to fight back as hard as he did. John found himself smirking at the thought of his eyes widening as she tore into him.

“Officer Egbert. Are you taking notes?”

His boss’ drone snapped him out of his daydream.

“Um, yes, of course, boss,” he blathered, and caught Jade’s eye across the desk. They just about kept it together.

The interrogation room was, obviously, laid out to make the suspect as uncomfortable as possible. It was a tiny space, with a single desk; John sat on one side of it and on the other, two chairs were positioned, facing each other. Jade had been placed in the one in the corner, and now one of her wrists was cuffed to a pipe sticking out of the wall. A wall lantern just above her was streaming painfully bright white light down onto her, washing her out and making her look small and scared, but there was determined grit in her narrowed eyes.

John’s feet scraped across the hardwood as he crossed his legs under his chair, leaning forward onto the desk with one elbow, other hand clutching a pen and scribbling down the details of the case. His boss was obviously waiting for him, because once he flicked his gaze up again, pen poised, English nodded and continued.

“The evidence against you. Is substantial. Your fingerprints were found on many surfaces in the home. Your blood and hair were in the room with the body. Traces of your signature alchemical preparations were found. Did you really expect. To cover your tracks that easily?”

As he jotted all of this down, John swelled with pride. She had done a good job. She was a genius. He looked up, and Jade was stony and disaffected.

“Why would you do such a thing? I do not believe. That you had previously met Lord Langley. And you do not look like a murderer.”

“No,” Jade said softly.

“So what is it. That would drive you to this?”

English stood, and laid a hand on Jade’s shoulder, imposing in front of her.

“That evening. Did he invite you inside?”

“Yes, he did.”

“Did he invite you to stay the night?”

“Yes.”

“And was that invitation. Under the assumption. That you would sleep with Lord Langley?”

“Yes, it was.”

John wrote.

“You sell yourself for money.”

“Yes.”

Eli frowned and threw a swift glance in John’s direction. John nodded, and scribbled this into his notes.

“Perhaps. You disagreed over payment? You felt offended. So you killed him.”

Jade nodded, biting her lip.

“He didn’t want –”

She stopped herself, and then looked down at her lap.

“Go on.”

Tentatively, Jade looked up, locking eyes with English. He really was a terrible interrogator.

“He didn’t want to pay me, and, um, he was trying to throw me out of his house, and I fought back and before I knew it he was just dead!”

Now tears spilled down her cheeks, and John wasn’t sure if they were fake or real but either way they were well-timed.

“I didn’t mean to do it!” she sobbed, and English nodded, patting her shoulder.

“Thank you. For your co-operation. Egbert will take care of you now.”

“Okay,” Jade sniffed.

The door clicked shut behind English and John was up in an instant; he circled the desk and uncuffed Jade from the wall. She snatched back her wrist, cradling a reddened area in her other hand. Her tears had stopped by now.

“Do you think he bought it?” she said, barely raising her voice above the silence in case English was still listening at the door.

John nodded imperceptibly, and then opened one of the desk drawers, removing a standard confession form. He laid it down on the desk and Jade pulled up her chair, taking John’s pen and starting to fill in her personal details.

“You just have to write down everything that happened,” he said. “And make it clear that you’re admitting to the crime. Your trial will probably be short because you’re willing to go to prison already, they’ll just decide how long your sentence will be.”

“How long will it be?” she said, looking up at him with still-damp eyes. Jade green. God, he was going to miss her.

“For life, probably,” he said, still staring her in the eye. She glanced away briefly, as if to consider this, and then looked back at her confession form. They sat there in silence for a while, punctuated by the sound of her scratchy scribbling.

Eventually, she piped up, “You know what I said about Karkat?”

“How could I forget?” John said dully, smirking.

“I wasn’t kidding around. You had better do as I said.”

She didn’t even need to look at him for John to feel the threat in her words. Jade was very aggressive in forcing John to do what was best for him, and he could half-imagine her wresting her way out of prison to come and drag him by the ear to Karkat’s apartment.

“I will.”

* * *

“Upon consideration of all the evidence, has the jury reached a unanimous verdict?”

“Yes.”

“The jury finds the defendant guilty.”

“Jade Harley, you have been convicted by the jury’s unanimous verdict of the murder of Lord Anthony Langley, who you brutally and ruthlessly attacked in his own home yesterday evening. This court is already well aware of your pro-troll leanings. You even stand before us today having artificially added horns to your own head, an abomination for which you were previously exiled from the city. That you have returned only to commit a violent act of murder speaks to your blatant disregard for Darkhaven and its citizens, and it for that reason that I sentence you to life imprisonment.”

John kissed Jade goodbye in her cell, in a fleeting moment before the jailor returned.

And then he had to go.

* * *

It was the second night in a row he’d turned up distraught and scattered outside Karkat’s door. This time Karkat didn’t ask questions, he just let John in, and John stalked past him, placing himself awkwardly in the middle of the room, radiating shame and self-hatred. Karkat calmly bristled by, grabbed a mug from the coffee table and sipped on it, watching him all the while. It was late in the day by now, around ten. John had been wandering around town visiting all the places he and Jade and Rose and Dave had grown up in. The swingsets were all rusted by now and the comic book stores were boarded up. On his way to Karkat’s he’d made a point to avoid where everyone else would be, skulking around underneath the Lower City streets to catch snippets of conversation that was still happy.

“What happened?” Karkat eventually said, still holding his coffee cup at his chest like it was a shield.

“She got a life sentence,” John replied numbly, staring at the floor at Karkat’s feet.

Karkat breathed in sharply through his nose, and then set down his mug. He rounded the table and for one startling second John thought Karkat was going to wrap his arms around him, but instead they stood face-to-face, Karkat’s chin tilted up just a little to look him in the eyes. And Karkat’s were tired eyes – exhausted, even. He couldn’t have been up for longer than a couple of hours by now, but already his eyes were puffy and blackened with sleeplessness; the thread-thin veins John had seen popping last night by now were glowing and irritated and his upper lids were heavy and swollen. He hadn’t even bothered to get dressed, still wearing boxers and a t-shirt.

“You look tired,” John murmured, and Karkat shook his head.

“I’m sorry, John.”

“Don’t feel sorry for me,” John snapped, and Karkat sighed, lips slanting into a frown.

“I know you two were close.”

“Karkat, don’t you get it?” John suddenly yelled. He’d had enough and Karkat was the only person who he felt okay venting to. “This is my fault! This is all my fault! If I could’ve been quicker to get back to Aradia then she wouldn’t have needed to kill that guy, I could have protected her! If I had been braver it could be me going to prison right now instead of Jade, if I were _smarter_ I could’ve thought up a better plan and now everything’s ruined because of me. Because _I_ showed up and I-I-I messed things up! Just like I always do! I messed everything up!”

John then threw himself down onto Karkat’s sofa and buried his face in his hands, fingertips pushing into his hair.

“I’m useless. I’m so sorry.”

“Not useless,” Karkat gravelled back, and this was so unexpected that John actually looked up to see that Karkat was determinedly staring at the floor, standing exactly where he had been a minute ago, jawline coloured by a stubborn red flush and mouth fixed in a slanted frown with a couple snaggly fangs sticking out.

“What?” John said, then swallowed the lump in his throat that always seemed to appear when he looked at Karkat.

“I said,” Karkat said begrudgingly, “Not. Useless.”

“But I can’t help any of you!”

“You make things better.”

John gave a bitter laugh and then his face screwed up again because he remembered Jade, and he slumped against the armrest for want of something to do with his body. 

“You – I – ugh.”

“What’s that supposed to mean?” John said, lip curling as he lifted his head.

“Shut the fuck up, Egbert,” Karkat rasped, slumping down onto the sofa next to him.

“Wow, Karkat. Real comforting.”

“John. As much as it pains me to admit this – and you _know_ it pains me – I am actually… really kind of glad that you’re here.”

“Karkat –”

“I know you make everyone happy. Aradia. Eridan. You’re our friend. And John, you tried your best for us. That means something.”

“Thanks, Karkat,” John said quietly. He wasn’t even sure what to feel any more. He had seen that Karkat could be kind to people but he never thought he would be on the receiving end. He was John. He wasn’t important. He never wanted to mean too much to anyone.

And then Karkat put his arm around John’s shoulders and John’s heart exploded.

“What are you d- Kar- you- I didn’t realise you were the cuddling type,” John eventually spat out, and Karkat dug his nails into John’s bicep.

“Don’t fuck this up, Egbert,” Karkat said dangerously, and John chuckled, exhausted, as he weaved his arm between Karkat’s back and the sofa cushion. They leaned against each other, empty and terrified but for the moment it was alright. There were words on John’s lips but he didn’t dare say them; after all, he had just been told not to fuck it up.

“I think I’m gonna take a week or two away from this place,” John said. “To look after Jade and everything.”

“Yeah. You should,” Karkat said, shifting his weight a little and relaxing down onto John’s shoulder. John would’ve screamed inwardly if he had the energy left. Instead, he loosened into it, too. He was too tired. 

“You look after yourself too, okay?” John said, and he made the mistake of looking down so that he got a faceful of warm smoky Karkat hair, and his brain broke all over again. This was just right.

“Sure thing, Egbert,” Karkat mumbled.

“You’re falling asleep,” John said, suppressing laughter as he smiled into Karkat’s tangles.

“Mhm.”

“You haven’t been sleeping, have you?” John murmured, and Karkat shook his head an inch either side. He remembered that he was the one who was supposed to be looking after Karkat. Jade had said so. “How come?”

“Someone has to be awake to deal with all the fucking terrible shit that keeps happening,” Karkat mumbled, and John curled his hand around Karkat’s elbow, giving it a reassuring squeeze.

“You sleep. I’ll wait up.”

“Are you sure?”

He would do anything for Karkat. He had known it from the very first day they’d met.

“Of course I’m sure,” he said, now running his hand the length of Karkat’s upper arm. “You go to sleep.”

“Don’t tell me what to do… fuckass,” Karkat rumbled, then grinned, cheek pushed against John’s chest.

“Just a friendly suggestion.”

“Shut your mouth and maybe I’ll be able to actually _get_ some sleep.”

John did as he was told, and sat there quietly, listening to the gentle rhythm of Karkat’s breaths, now gently thumbing his inner elbow. In spite of how draining this day had been, there was no danger of John falling asleep when Karkat needed him.

“John,” Karkat suddenly whispered.

“What’s up?”

Karkat now had a hold of his free hand and was pulling it up towards his head; John was about to protest before his fingertips met hard orange bone and he understood what was happening.

“It helps me sleep.”

“Whatever you want,” John said, and Karkat released his hand, curling it in his lap as John rubbed gently on one tiny orange nub. Surely this wasn’t platonic. Surely.

“Tell no one,” Karkat rasped, and John chuckled, bobbing Karkat on his chest.

“Your secret is safe with me,” he said softly, tracing a tiny circle over the tip of Karkat’s horn. Karkat slowly unravelled in his arms, sinking into a position so relaxed that John genuinely wouldn’t have believed it was him if he didn’t already know.

Soon, Karkat was dead to the world, snuffling quietly in John’s arms, occasionally twitching a limb or whining a little like he was having a bad dream. John felt privileged – and even that was an understatement – that he was the one who got to see this. He was the one who got to coax foul, fanged Karkat into sleep again.

And he was tired, too. So, so tired. He hadn’t slept properly in weeks, really, snatching hours here and there between shifts at work and late nights in the Living Room. Sleep deprivation was starting to catch up to him, but he could make it one more night. For Karkat.

“I think I am falling in love with you, Karkat Vantas,” John whispered into Karkat’s hair, and Karkat couldn’t possibly have heard, but all the same John felt better for having told him. Maybe one day he would tell him for real. Maybe one day he would hear it back.

Eventually, John stood, cradling Karkat in his arms – and he was surprisingly heavy for such a short little guy – and carried him to his bed, laying him down and pulling the covers up to his chin. Karkat grunted quietly once John broke away from him and, rolling his eyes, John sat down on the edge of Karkat’s bed so that they were back-to-back, warming each other through the sheets. Out of Karkat’s bedroom window, John watched the city streets like the watchful guardian he was supposed to be.

Nothing else bad would happen tonight. He would make sure.


	12. Bloodshot

**Notes for the Chapter:**

>  **Trigger warning:** Misogynistic language (single use)

“John. What are you doing in here? I need to see you in my office.”

John lifted his eyes from where he’d been blankly staring into his coffee mug, to see that his boss was standing in the doorway of the dim-lit cupboard, a muscle jumping in his jaw. Two weeks ago, one of his closest friends in the world had been thrown into a jail cell. Since then, John had been taking his breaks alone. It was too much to hear everyone gloating about the case, the biggest scandal to rock Darkhaven in months they said, finally that deserter bitch was getting her comeuppance, she belonged behind bars anyway, she was clearly insane, mutilating herself with troll horns like that, and to think she’d actually _lived with them_ in their hovel of a district –

“Egbert!”

Startled, John sloshed cold coffee over his lap, and then set his mug down on a shelf and stood, leaving behind his makeshift cardboard box seat. He hit his head on the low-hanging lantern and, with a sigh, he lay his hand over where he’d just cracked his skull and offered a watery smile to his boss.

“Come on,” English grunted, and John followed him down the corridor. This part of the Bastille was quiet, mostly a storage facility, with a few unluckily-located offices. He liked spending his breaks here. It was long stretches of corridor away from the busier parts, so he never had to overhear anything that could hurt him.

Soon they were in English’s office, a room that John was just about tired of seeing by now. There was a long pause, in which English circumnavigated his desk and sat down behind it. John remained standing, hands clasped behind his back, an empty, stoic expression on his face. He was a damn good actor, if nothing else.

English gave a drawn-out sigh, something like a kettle boiling, and John just kept on staring.

“You are very strong,” English eventually said, “To do that to your friend.”

“Thank you, sir.”

“I understand.”

How could he possibly understand?

“You made a good decision. To stand with the city. Rather than betray us for your friend.”

He hadn’t made any decision. Jade had been the one pulling the strings. John had just followed her orders, because that was what he did.

“You have earned my trust. I even admit that I am impressed.”

John didn’t laugh, but he wanted to. He knew who really had his heart. His loyalties lay with Karkat and all the rest of them.

“Thanks, boss,” John eventually said, not quite looking English in the eye. “That, uh, that means a lot.”

“You can take time off. Come back in a week.”

John’s heart leapt. A whole week that he could spend with his friends, without having to worry about sleep patterns or running a double life.

“Alright,” he said, but English didn’t smile. With a wave of his hand, John was dismissed.

* * *

He didn’t stop by the Living Room. He knew that was probably a terrible thing to do, but he could check on them all on the way back. John swept through the Lower City streets, having thrown off his oppressive Lamplighter uniform in favour of jeans and that hoodie he loved so much, the one that by now was starting to lose its characteristic smoky smell. He’d just have to spend more time in Karkat’s apartment. And that was the plan.

When he drew up outside the building, he was relieved to see that it looked much the same as it had two weeks ago. A couple of windows on the ground floor were boarded up, but that was becoming ever more common in the city, so he didn’t worry. The main door to the building wasn’t locked, which seemed like a pretty silly thing to do given the circumstances, so once he’d passed through he clicked it shut behind him.

Then he bounded up the stairs two at a time, heart fluttering like a freed bird in his throat. He would see Karkat again. The last two weeks had been like lying under a boulder, and around Karkat he felt more like a person again. He hammered his fist on Karkat’s apartment door, and waited.

And waited.

And…

Waited.

“Karkat?” he called, rapping his knuckles on the door again. Maybe Karkat wasn’t in. He’d have to stop by the Living Room after all –

The door opened an inch, just enough so that John could see a narrowed sliver of yellow glinting at him. His initial elation died away instantly once he realised that eye was heavily-dressed with swollen, tender, fever-red flesh, and hung with eyebags so deeply coloured that they were fully purple. The door swung open, and Karkat shuffled back across the room, stumbling into the armrest of his sofa and collapsing forward over it, landing on his face on a sofa cushion.

It took John less than two seconds to fling the door shut and sweep across the room, kneeling down at Karkat’s side.

“Karkat, are you okay?” John whispered, as Karkat rolled onto his side, gathering his knobbly knees up to his chest and frowning across at John with his puffy eyes screwed shut. An asymmetrical scarlet blush had putrefied across his cheekbones and rode the bridge of his nose, and his lips were sore, chewed up and blood-beaded. He had also just started up trembling. As carefully as he could, John pushed back the hair hanging over Karkat’s forehead, and Karkat whimpered, devastated at the touch. Holding the back of his hand against the exposed skin, John frowned; he was blistering to the touch and quaking like a little mouse.

“It hurts,” Karkat rasped, and his voice was even gravellier than usual, and he whined with the pain.

“Hey, it’s okay, Karkat, don’t worry,” John said, smoothing the hair back over Karkat’s forehead. “It’s just the flu, I think. I told you to look after yourself, silly!”

Karkat frowned at him, flashing a couple teeth. His eyes were still shut.

“What about Gamzee? Isn’t he supposed to take care of you?”

Karkat nodded, once, and then sluggishly moved a hand up towards his throat, frown intensifying. Taking the hint, John pressed his cool fingers against the burning underside of Karkat’s chin.

“Where is he?”

“He’s not a bad moirail,” Karkat whispered, in his flu-strangled growl. “Just paranoid. Germophobic.”

“Okay. Well I am not either of those things so I guess I can look after you until you get better!”

“That’s cheating.”

“What? On Gamzee? Is platonic cheating a thing?”

“Mhm.”

“Then what about… the other night? Was that cheating?”

Karkat’s dark brows knitted in the centre, and whether it was out of exasperation or distress, John couldn’t tell. He didn’t fully understand troll romance. Did this mean he was cheating on Eridan, too? If he had a crush on Karkat, maybe that made it okay?

“Just don’t mention it to him.”

“Okay. Quit talking, you’re gonna make your throat hurt worse.”

Then, John stood up, and for the second time found himself carrying Karkat to bed. This time Karkat didn’t seem remotely happy about it; he knocked his fists gently against John’s chest, too exhausted to do anything worse than that, and made a little furious sound in the back of his throat, like a grumpy cat. John snorted and shifted Karkat’s weight in his arms, tapping his foot against the bedroom door to swing it open.

“My boss gave me a week off. I can stick around until you get better.”

Again, five bony knuckles collided with his collarbone.

“You’re very welcome,” John chuckled, and then lay Karkat down on his unmade bed, sweeping the covers gently over him. Karkat threw them off again a second later and, rolling his eyes, John tugged them back up, pinning them down on either side of Karkat’s chest and leaning over him menacingly. Karkat opened his eyes finally, to narrowed, murderous slivers.

“Play nice, Karkat. You need to keep warm,” he said, and then leaned down dangerously, teasingly low, so that their noses were almost touching. He wasn’t worried about getting whatever Karkat had, even when Karkat deliberately coughed in his face. That was gross and yet John still really, really wanted to kiss him.

“Now, you stay there,” John said, and shortly he’d gathered a few spare pillows from Karkat’s wardrobe, which he fluffed up and lay under Karkat’s head so that his chest and shoulders were on an incline and his breathing seemed to have eased up just a little.

John sat on the edge of the bed, twisted so that he could watch Karkat breathe, chest rattling away as it desperately tried to work the air. He was bright and burning and he radiated sickness, from the hollows of his cheeks and the crooks of his eyebags. His dust-coloured skin was blotched with ugly patches of pink and red where the heat and taint were surfacing. He should’ve been repulsive, driving John to run away, but there was nothing Karkat Vantas could ever do to make John want him any less.

“You want something to drink?”

Karkat just about nodded, once.

“Are you gonna stay put?”

Another nod, a little grumpy jerk of the head. John chuckled.

In a minute he’d returned, with steaming hot water and honey and lemon, and when Karkat tried to lift his arms John stayed them with a hand.

“Don’t you move.”

He’d made it up with enough cold water that it was ready to drink, and he pressed the rim of the mug against Karkat’s lips, and even though this was an enormous indignity, Karkat still drank desperately and over-quickly, dribbling down his chin and draining the mug faster than John could tilt it. He hadn’t been looking after himself at all.

“Good thing I’m here, huh?”

Karkat gurgled furiously.

“Don’t take that tone of voice with me, mister,” John giggled, and Karkat flapped one hand uselessly under the covers.

After another second, he’d drained the mug.

“Go to hell,” Karkat mumbled, his grating voice smoothed a little by the honey.

“And leave you behind?” John said, looking down, but smirking. “Never.”

“Dork.”

Sighing, John set the mug down on the bedside table. “Tell me something I don’t know, heh.”

“You’re handsome.”

“Sorry, _what?_ ” John spat, head snapping to stare at Karkat so quick that his glasses nearly fell off his face. Karkat mumbled something indistinct and then sank further into his pillows.

“Karkat? What did you just… Karkat…?”

“Shut up, Egbert, I’m trying to sleep.”

John’s jaw tightened. “Damn it, Karkat,” he muttered, and he swore he saw a slanted smirk creep across Karkat’s face, just before he fell asleep.

* * *

John slept on the sofa, and kept Karkat’s bedroom door open a crack. Whenever he heard a whimper or a growl or so much as a cough he would leap up and sprint to Karkat’s aid. The next night, John was woken by the quiet strain of a whining note that was the most heartbreaking thing he’d ever heard. In half a second he was up, scrubbing sleep from his eyes with the back of one hand and grabbing his glasses with the other. Then he was at Karkat’s bedside again.

“What’s the matter, crabby?” he said hoarsely, peeling back the covers to reveal a curled-up ball of shakes and reddened limbs.

“Hurts.”

“Where?”

“Back.”

“What do you want me to do?”

“Use your fucking brain, Egbert.”

John was pretty sure that if he rolled his eyes one more time at Karkat they would just fall right out of his face, but all the same, he held Karkat gently by the shoulders and pulled him up into a slumped sitting position, crawling around him on the bed to sit cross-legged behind him. Karkat leaned forwards, propping his elbows on his knees and his chin in his hands, head dipping so that John could see all the cherry red at the nape of Karkat’s neck even in the dull light. It was dark and it was quiet and it was so so hot between them.

“Backrub, right?”

“Yeah.”

He remembered he had almost walked in on Gamzee rubbing Karkat’s back, once. Karkat had snapped at him, for not being gentle enough, and gentle was something that John could do. He laid his hands on Karkat’s shoulders over his threadbare t-shirt, which was letting the heat of his clammy skin through. Karkat tensed at the touch before John had even done anything, but the slightest pressure of John’s thumbs against his shoulderblades teased him into relaxing again. John moved the pads of his thumbs in tiny, slow circles, trying to dissipate the stress and strain that defined Karkat. It seemed like it was working because Karkat had tipped back his head, and when John checked, his eyes had slipped shut, and if he listened closely enough he could hear these tiny noises of appreciation from a hoarse place in Karkat’s throat.

“You said I was handsome,” John said conversationally, letting his fingertips slip in juddering lengths down either side of Karkat’s spine to sit at its base, where he padded and circled.

“You didn’t know.”

Well, this was happening. John decided not to try and fight it.

“To be honest, no, I did not,” John said, flushing, eternally grateful that Karkat didn’t have eyes in the back of his head. “I mean, it’s not like my friends don’t tell me that or whatever, but… I just don’t see it, I guess!”

“The buck teeth don’t help.”

“Hey!” John snapped, but kept his fingers moving as gently as he could. “Eridan said they were cute.”

Karkat snorted.

“Am I doing this right?”

“Yeah. Up a little.”

John did as he was told, rubbing the knots in Karkat’s supple back away with the pads of his fingers. Karkat _actually_ groaned at that, and John was pretty sure that his head _actually_ exploded.

“Woah, Karkat!” he said, ears burning.

“Fuck, that’s embarrassing.”

John couldn’t help but instantly wonder if Gamzee had ever made Karkat moan like that, and then he wanted to punch himself in the face. He was a good guy, really, and he wasn’t about to take advantage of poor fever-sick Karkat! But still…

“No, it’s okay, um, I’m glad you like it.”

“It’s just really fucking painful.”

“Yeah, well, you should’ve been taking better care of yourself,” John said, picking his fingers up and placing them back at Karkat’s shoulderblades. “I bet you weren’t getting any sleep.”

“It’s hard sleeping when you think that someone might try and burn your fucking building down any minute,” Karkat gravelled. “Or break in. Or murder you.”

John’s fingers stalled, and before logic could mediate his actions he’d leaned forwards and wrapped his arms around Karkat’s shoulders.

“John,” Karkat mumbled in a half-warning tone, but leaned back all the same, and John uncrossed his legs so that Karkat could fit inbetween them, shuffling to press his burning back against John’s solid chest.

“It’s okay, you know,” John said into Karkat’s hair.

“It’s not, though, really.”

“Well, okay, yeah, I guess it is kind of shitty,” John said, and Karkat laughed at him. They weren’t going to talk about the fact that whatever was happening between them right now was really really red and shockingly intimate. John could tell that much already, but he didn’t mind. He liked it this way, when they were together warmed by the splaying syrupy lamplight, alone under a halo of quiet and peace, and they could just breathe.

“It’s only a matter of time before everything gets really fucking terrible,” Karkat said, twisting a little in John’s arms so that his cheek was flush with John’s chest.

“I’ll be here no matter what happens.”

“I know.”

He didn’t know what to do. He was so in love with this tiny broken thing in his arms and he wanted to be the one to carry Karkat to bed _every_ night that Karkat needed him to and he wanted to hold him like this forever and let him drink sips of honey and lemon and stroke his hair and his back, and pet the hurt away, and he wanted to be the one who was around when Karkat needed someone, but he didn’t want to be a moirail, no, he wanted to kiss Karkat on every inch and angle of his tough knotty body, he wanted to take up permanent residence in between Karkat’s sickle-sharp collarbones and wake up next to him every morning and tell him that he loved him until Karkat was sick of hearing him and told him to shut up. And then he would tell him some more. And he would never ever let go.

“You seem like you’re getting better already,” he eventually said, rubbing his palm against the firm line of Karkat’s waist.

“I’ve been asleep for twelve hours,” Karkat said. “I mean I still feel like someone put me through a meat grinder. It’ll get worse. But the sleep helps.”

“Do you want anything? A drink, or something?”

“No. Don’t move.”

John chuckled. “Whatever you want, Karkat.”

* * *

Karkat had thrown up eight times today alone. Right now he was hiding underneath his covers, refusing to surface, insisting that it was the sight of John’s face that was making him ill.

“Karkat, I think you are probably just embarrassed because you are totally gross.”

The huddled mass under the covers growled back at him.

“But it’s okay! Everybody throws up on themselves sometimes!”

“I hate you so, so much.”

“Will you come out? I know my face makes you sick and everything but you need to drink.”

Karkat peeled back one corner of the sheet to fix John with a distrustful, eye-bugging stare.

“C’mon. I think you’re done puking for today. It’s safe to have a couple sips.”

Sometimes, Karkat was a big tangle of thorns and brambles, the angriest thing that John had ever seen. He would shout as best he could with his sickness-riddled lungs, and wheeze and rattle and curse and tell John he was useless and annoying and boring. And then other times he was tender and quiet and let John tip warm drinks down his throat and he’d go to sleep when John asked. He was just being grumpy and unreasonable because he was ill, John understood.

“Do you want medicine, too?”

“More than anything.”

Karkat was good, and took his pills, and sipped his tea, and wore his blankets like a shroud. He had even let John wash his hair over the kitchen sink, earlier, with the stipulation that he was _careful around his god damn horns because for fuck’s sake, John, they’re not toys_. It was funny because they both knew Karkat loved it when John touched his horns. John felt like he was starting to understand that not all of Karkat could be defined by the angry front he put up, and there were reasons for its being there that were surprising and painful.

“You don’t like yourself, do you?”

“Can we not have a fucking therapy session, Egbert? I’m not in the mood to talk to _you_ about anything,” Karkat snarled, slamming his mug down on the bedside table with more force than was justifiable.

“But you don’t.”

Now Karkat stared at the floor.

“I like you. I think I probably like you enough for two people,” John said, snorting and coming dangerously, tantalisingly close to the confession Jade had made him promise he’d deliver.

“Yeah, and you’re a bucktoothed assbucket who doesn’t know anything about… anything.”

“You’re mean to people because you don’t understand why they’d like you. So you don’t trust them. Right?”

“Shut the fuck up.”

“Karkat, it’s really okay to feel like that,” John said, and his hand slipped under the blankets to find Karkat’s, and he must have done something right because Karkat didn’t slap him away. “Did someone… maybe hurt you before?”

“None of your god damn business.”

John ran his thumb over the back of Karkat’s hand, and he didn’t say anything. Karkat filled the silence after a minute or two.

“Dave. And Terezi. He cheated on me with her, he knew I liked her for the longest time, whatever. Eridan. Slept with me because I was there and I was nice. Things like that, John. It makes you realise that you don’t actually mean that much to anyone and you can’t fucking trust anybody.”

“You were the first troll I ever saw, Karkat.”

“The fuck does that have to do with anything I just said?”

“Shut up for once and you’ll find out, geez!” John said, grinning as he squeezed Karkat’s hand. Karkat glared at him. “I get that you don’t think you’re special, but you always will be to me. Not just because I thought you were so amazing the first second I saw you, but because… you made me realise I wasn’t happy, not before. When I tried to go back to that life, you hunted me down and wouldn’t take no for an answer. You have helped me so much, Karkat, and gosh I just…”

_I just love you and want to hold you for the rest of forever but our time’s running out and I’m not that brave._

“I don’t know what to think about you, John,” Karkat said. “Sometimes I think you’re okay. And then sometimes I think you’re a total moron.”

“I am probably both of those things,” John said, and Karkat snorted, throwing himself against John’s chest and knocking John’s collarbones with his nubby horns. John tucked Karkat up in his arms, holding him through his cocoon of blankets.

“I want to like you, though.”

“I would love it if you did.”

“Maybe I’ll work on it.”

“But you’ll still be mean to me, right? I don’t know what I would do without you to remind me how terrible I am every now and again.”

Karkat laughed hoarsely, shoulders trembling. “Obviously.”

“Good.”

* * *

Two nights later, somehow or another, John had ended up lying in Karkat’s bed. Well, actually, he knew exactly how it had happened, but it was still traumatising and tonight he was lying awake and keeping an eye out because Karkat had been right when he’d said that he was going to get worse. Every time Karkat rolled over in his sleep, John’s heart jumped into his throat. It had started yesterday afternoon, when he’d forgotten John’s name. And then he had forgotten who John was completely, and thrown a chair at him, and tried to knock him out with soft but frantic punches because he’d thought John was an intruder. Fever-induced delirium, John guessed, and it was okay because eventually hair petting had calmed Karkat down.

But the night terrors, no, John didn’t know how to deal with those. Tonight was different because he had Bec to help; the dog was curled up at the foot of Karkat’s bed, snuffling in his sleep. It had been so terrifying.

It started with the sleep talking.

“Please don’t hurt me,” Karkat whimpered, and John jumped, rolling over to face Karkat, who was still very much asleep.

“Oh, no,” John whispered, and kicked Bec, who woke up instantly, ears pricked.

“Please don’t… I don’t want to die yet!”

Karkat convulsed, throwing the covers off. His voice had risen to an urgent, strangled yell, and John didn’t know what to do, because last night, touching him had made it a thousand times worse. And it had been terrible.

“Not John, no, no no no, me and not him, let him be happy.”

“I wouldn’t be happy without you, Karkat,” John whispered, and Karkat twitched, jerking his head, scowling, eyelids clenched.

“John go back, John, you won’t die for me, _John_.”

Bec whimpered, fixing all his big wet eyes in Karkat’s direction. John’s heart was pounding. He didn’t know what to do.

Suddenly Karkat sat bolt upright as though electrified, crying out in terror and throwing the covers off from where they were tangled around his legs, he was hyperventilating and caught in the sheets and John shot up, too, peeling them back to free a terrified Karkat who had now collapsed back onto the pillows and dissolved into unintelligible yelling and twitching.

“It’s okay,” John said, but he wasn’t even sure Karkat was awake. “It’s okay.”

He laid his hand on Karkat’s shoulder and got punched in the jaw for his troubles; his head snapped back and he bit down on his alarmed yelp.

“Shit! John, what the fuck just happened?” Karkat said, suddenly still, now blinking rapidly and trying to focus his eyes on John. Ignoring the intense pain that now throbbed under his ear, John smiled patiently.

“You had a nightmare or something,” he said, casually rubbing the spot where he’d tomorrow find a bruise, “It’s okay.”

“Again? Fuck. I’m sorry,” Karkat said, covering his face with his hands.

“It’s really, really okay.”

John caught hold of one of Karkat’s wrists and gently tugged his hand away from his face.

“You’re ill. You can’t help it.”

“My heart is fucking pounding,” Karkat stammered, grabbing John’s hand to press it against his chest. “What the fuck…”

“Just a bad dream,” John said, feeling the thump and desperate patter of Karkat’s heart under his palm. “I’m here. It’s safe.”

“I’m still scared,” Karkat said, voice cracking, and John would remember that instant for the rest of his life as the moment when all of Karkat’s barricades really crumbled and the armour split and he let John get underneath his skin, finally, because he was willing to be _really_ vulnerable, and lucid, and John somehow felt like he was seeing him for the first time, here shaking in his bed, wild and terrified, uncurling before him with all his vitals on show. 

“It’s just fine. Look, it’s just you, me, and Bec. Nobody here that you can’t trust.”

“They’re going to fucking slaughter all of us, John. It’s just a matter of time.”

“Don’t talk like that, Karkat. We’ll… we’ll think of something.”

“What the fuck does that mean, John?!” Karkat snapped. “Does it even mean anything?”

“It’s going to be okay.”

“You keep saying that but I don’t even think _you_ believe it, John. I… fuck.”

“Karkat, listen. Just listen to the city, for a sec,” John said, and Karkat did as he was told, and John listened with him. Nothing. They locked eyes, and John’s mouth was a staunch and stony line because he was always dependable and always there. “Right now everything is fine. I know the future is scary but it hasn’t happened yet so try not to worry. I know that you never relax, and that’s just a Karkat thing, but at least try. If it helps, no matter what happens, I’ll be around.”

“John, when things do start getting really bad… when they come to kill us or whatever it is they’re going to do, I don’t care if you want to play the hero. I’m not going to let them find out you had anything to do with us.”

“Karkat! You’re my friends, I want to fight for you, I would die for you if I had to!”

“You’re not dying for us. I’m not going to let that happen, John.”

“Why not?”

“I like you too much to let you,” Karkat said quietly, now looking at an indeterminate spot on John’s chest. “It’s… unfortunate.”

“Gosh, you’re so annoying!” John whined, gathering Karkat into his chest and snuggling into the pillows. Karkat snatched the covers and pulled them up over the two of them, and John sighed into his hair. A few moments’ precious silence passed, and sleep tugged at the edges of John’s eyelids, and he softened, and flattened, and the line of his breath smoothed out.

“John?” Karkat said, tentatively biting into the silence.

“Yeah?”

“I…”

He trailed off, making a noise in the back of his throat, a little guttural non-committal thing like his thoughts had just crashed into each other and none of them wanted to come out.

“You what?”

“Forget it,” Karkat mumbled into his chest.

“Tell me!” John insisted, prodding the base of Karkat’s spine. Gently.

“No. I’ll tell you… later.”

They were lying chest to chest, arms tangled around each other. Words were just technicalities. They both knew what this was. For tonight it was enough to just enjoy each other and know that they’d both last the night.

“Okay,” John said. He thought he could guess what secret Karkat was sitting on. “But, um, whatever it was you wanted to say… me, too.”

His voice had waned into a whisper that was barely there at all.

Karkat lifted his head, to meet John’s eyes, and John felt his heart swell.

“Really?”

“Yeah, really. Heh. For the longest time.”

Karkat smirked at him. “I should’ve known.”

Then he buried his head back in the crook of John’s neck.

“Goodnight, John.”

“Night, Karkat.”

John lay on one side of Karkat, and Bec had crammed himself tight into the space on the other side so that the three of them were squashed together, smelling of sickness and dog but also warmth and freshly laundered bedsheets and if John screwed his eyes shut hard enough against the treacle light he thought he could imagine that this would be forever.

_Sometimes there are things that are easier not to say, and the weight of the fear in your chest is, at least for the moment, too much. Too much to let you see that anything could happen, really, so you carry on with your tiny life believing that this thing, this mad and implausible thing that you’ve gotten yourself all tangled up in is not going to happen, can never be, will eventually fade into some dim and dusty corner of your mind and one day you’ll look back and think you remember – but you won’t. You’ll stop feeling the way you did then. And you’ll forget exactly what it was like, John._

_You’ll forget._

_And the worst part is you won’t even know it’s too late, until it is._


	13. Broken Bird

**Notes for the Chapter:**

>  **Trigger warning:** Burglary

Karkat hadn’t recovered by the time John had to leave, a fact that kept up its pounding on the sides of John’s skull as he traipsed down tarred streets, flicking his lighter absently, irritably, the little red light popping in and out of life at the corner of his eye. He had been back at work for three days so far, and he’d been good, he’d stayed away from the Lower City and he was being sensible and careful and keeping his head on straight. But it was difficult, it was heart-wrenching even, to be constantly wondering if his friends were still safe, to have that persistent worry chewing on his brain, spreading like black mould. Three days was a long time; it was too long, when the situation was evolving more quickly than he could keep an eye on, and he was spreading himself so thin, and he wasn’t sleeping, and he wasn’t even doing his job properly was the funny part, couldn’t even concentrate for long enough to light a lamp.

He’d made a deal with himself. A compromise. That if he could survive this afternoon’s shift, then he would visit the Living Room this evening; he wasn’t on late watch, he could afford another night away, he could keep playing the game. He had to keep it together because he was their only reliable source of information and they _needed him_ but he was starting to need them too in a way he hadn’t imagined. He needed to talk to Aradia about Jade so that they could sit through this pain together and he wouldn’t feel so alone. He needed Eridan, even just to make him smile, to reassure him that he was doing the right thing because John wasn’t even so sure he was a good person any more. And he needed Karkat, and that was hardest of all to grasp. Those feelings were smoke between his fingers.

A lanternlight swooshed into life by his white-knuckled hand, quivering gold and suffocated, smothered by the soot haze.

“You’re only human, you know,” Karkat had said to him, the other night, and John had laughed. Told him that he was made of steel. That he could fix anything, and he would. But he was just one person, with no plan, waiting for someone to tell him what was going to happen.

They probably needed to seal the grates and stop people getting in. But then they wouldn’t be able to get _out_ , and they would starve, and John wasn’t smart enough to figure this out on his own, and they’d thrown Jade in prison, and she was brilliant.

“I’ll figure it out,” he had promised Karkat, and it meant something painful and important to him, to know that Karkat trusted him. But he was just John. He was average in every sense of the word and he was stupid, too, and it was a lot easier to ruin everything than it was to save them all, and he could feel himself slipping.

He stared up, into a space sick with soot and lamplight; the Brume’s sallow halo ghosted over him, its watery seeping edges shooting for the city ceiling. People jostled around him as he stood, there in the street, watching smoke clouds collapse under their own girth and swell, sweep over the rooftops, swallow the light and spit it back out ochre and warped. This city was bigger than him. It ran on a pace he could never keep, a drumming beat that wouldn’t let up. It was time to start running.

Yeah, he was going to figure it out.

* * *

By the time John’s shift ended, the factories had long since closed, and the neon streets of the Lower City were alive with noises and lights, and people milling around, drinking and laughing and swapping kisses beneath tangles of lamps that criss-crossed their way over every avenue, daubing the streets with globes of colour. The sound was infectious, it seeped under his skin and put his very bones at ease again; the muffled cadence of thrilling music cut with the softest undertones of gentle words, and then the abrasive huff of passionate conversation, and John could feel that he was connected, too, to this place. The lanterns painted him.

And yet… he still didn’t belong. Not a single head turned in his direction. Friends called out to friends, lovers found each other in the masses, even strangers looped arms and staggered drunkenly down the streets but he was as inconspicuous as anything. It was better this way. It was better to not get too close to anyone and treat the whole thing like a game that had to be won; sentiment was his biggest flaw, and it wasn’t his fault that he was only human, but he was soft.

He just couldn’t help it. When the door to the Living Room creaked open and let out a swinging upbeat of music, he felt a familiar swoosh in his stomach as the adrenaline started its pounding course through to his fingertips, lighting his blood on fire. Friday nights at the Living Room were an institution, and tonight was as vibrant as ever.

“John!” Nepeta yelled in his face, over the half-muffled roar of music from the bar downstairs. She threw her arms around his neck and the force of John’s return hug literally lifted her several inches from the ground, and she squealed in delight. “Come in, we haven’t seen you in furever!” she said, once he’d set her back down.

She grabbed one of his fingers in her little grey hand and led him, dashing, down the stairs; she whipped elegantly around a couple who were lying, limbs entwined, over five steps – John accidentally stamped on one of them, but they were too drunk or otherwise too _distracted_ to notice. He and Nepeta blustered through the door at the bottom of the narrow stairs, and John’s face split into a grin for the first time in days.

He was glad he’d made the effort to dress up, in his white button-down and bowtie, because wow, the place was _slamming_ and everyone was sparkling in their finery.

MC Dave Strider was working the crowd tonight, which suited John’s ears just fine; a bobbing and blipping melody slicked its way through the buzz of conversation, with the swing of smooth jazz and the scratchy distorted sounds that Dave loved so much. Rhythmically the twang of Dave’s voice would sound under a doodle-pip or skiddleebop, and from time to time he’d laugh, and the tempo didn’t let up – there was a reason the place was packed, and it was because Dave Strider was in the house, and he was fantastic at what he did and he loved it, but not as much as everyone else did.

It didn’t take John longer than five minutes to lose himself in the crowd of milling, moving bodies. Someone pushed a drink into his hand to the swell of a trumpet section, and he thanked them in the half-second he had before they were gone, too, moving between people. This was better. This was home. The place was bright and hot with lanternlight and incandescence, and there was a smell in the air, the taste of hundreds of strands of perfume tangled with the sickly-smooth scent of alcohol-flavoured breath. He had the advantage of being almost a head taller than most of the people here tonight, but scour the throngs as he might, he didn’t catch any sight of a scruffy-haired head crowned with little beany horns.

He’d keep looking, he decided; he managed to push himself to the edge of the room, out of the heat of the dance floor and towards the booth-lined opposite wall. Most of them were occupied by people too drunk or danced-out to stand – ladies rubbing their feet with their heels set aside, and little groups of men laughing together under the diffuse glow of a golden lantern. Karkat wasn’t here, either, but he did spy Feferi and Eridan together in a corner booth, uncharacteristically serious-looking, poring over something that from here looked like paperwork. Brow furrowing, he approached them, only to spy Terezi coming from the opposite direction, grinning her head off.

“What’s going on over here? Smells like… _deceit,_ ” John heard Terezi coo slyly, her voice lilting over the music, before he drew up beside her.

“Terezi, I am refusin’ to believe that deceit smells a anythin’,” Eridan drawled, flipping over the papers in front of him with a smooth flick of his wrist, concealing every word. “Evenin’, John.”

“Does too!” Terezi snapped, affronted, as John raised his drink to his moirail in greeting. “It smells like yeast.” She said this as though it were the most obvious thing in the world, grinning all the while.

“Yeast? _Yeast?_ ” Eridan flapped, gesticulating his confusion, rings glimmering in the merry light. John and Feferi caught each other’s’ eye, and this got Feferi giggling behind her hands.

“What are you two doing, anyway?” John said, gaze flicking down to the mystery papers again. Blank white pages and scattered envelopes. “Sure seems suspicious!”

“None a your business, darlin’ moirail, so shoo. We got things to discuss.”

“Oh, okay,” John said, pouting just a little. “Have you seen Karkat? Or, uh, smelled him… Terezi?”

Feferi and Eridan glanced at each other across the table before shaking their heads, both smirking knowingly. Terezi’s nostrils flared and thinned as she sniffed the air sharply, and then her tongue darted past her lips for a fraction of a second before she shook her head.

“There is in fact a notable absence of cherry in the air tonight,” she said, pushing her glasses up her nose. “He’s not nearby, wherever he is!”

“Oh. I guess I’ll keep looking. Thanks!”

He made a big deal of setting his empty glass down on the table, trying to eye what those papers might be, before Eridan swatted him away with a gentle backhand to the chest.

“Get gone, you meddlin’ ass,” he snipped, and, laughing, John backed away, leaving Feferi giggling in his wake. He noticed Terezi slip into the booth, and in his peripheral vision he watched Eridan flip the paper back over again, as John rejoined the crowd. So _she_ was allowed to see them, but _he_ wasn’t? He had half a mind to go back over and tell Eridan off, but he was distracted pretty quickly by Rose, who pulled him in between her and Kanaya.

“Woah, you both look amazing!” he exclaimed, a little dorkily, but gosh they looked fantastic; Rose in a black-on-black fringed affair that fluttered as she let John spin her to the swing of the music, and Kanaya in a long and tight jade green dress with a slit up to _there_ , and John briefly thought on how they were probably just keeping up appearances, because everything was starting to come apart at the seams – but then he propped up his smile again. Business was business, the show must go on, and all that stuff.

“You don’t look so awful yourself, John,” Kanaya said, dropping a little of her usually affected tone probably because of martinis, “Karkat is a lucky boy.”

“Oh, uh, it’s not like that with us,” John attempted, but her cunning grin was all-pervading, and before he knew it he was blushing. He tried to play it off as just the heat of the club. “Speaking of Karkat, have you seen him?”

“Not yet,” Rose said, shrugging. “He could be around…”

“Alright. Maybe he’s over there or something,” John said, gesturing vaguely into the distance, and let Rose kiss him on the cheek before he threaded back into the crowd. All he wanted was to see Karkat again!

He’d barely worked his way through thirty seconds’ worth of awkward squeezing between people when Nepeta had a hold of his wrist and had managed to wriggle her way to him.

“John! There you are! Hi, again!” she trilled, grinning up at him, her enormous olive eyes as adorable as ever.

“Oh, hey again, Nepeta,” John said, smiling back. He could still feel the prickling warmth of his ridiculous flush crawling up his neck. “Have you seen Karkat?”

He was starting to sound like a stuck record.

“Karkitty? Not yet,” Nepeta said, frowning a little at the fact she’d had to disappoint him.

“Karkitty?” John snorted. “Wow, I am going to have to start calling him that.”

“He hates it!”

“I bet,” John said, and they giggled.

“Did you want to see him fur something? Maybe I can help?”

“Thanks, Nepeta! But I just wanted to… just to see him, I guess,” John said, and it felt like a confession, and he was glad the music swallowed it the second it had come out because it was _embarrassing_.

Nepeta nodded chirpily and petted the back of his hand. Then she glanced up at the ceiling for two seconds, and stared back at him, and her face was illuminated by an intense, eye-bugging comprehension that put a furrow in John’s brow.

“Why didn’t I see it befurr? It’s so obvious!”

“What’s obvious?”

“You two! What should I call it… _Johnkat_.”

“Nepeta what are you – we’re not – Nepeta _no_ –”

She’d already skittered away, gleefully, into the crowd. He watched her re-join with Equius, whose dark shades glinted in his direction, and John felt the sudden and extreme urge to fall into a fire. Instead, he buried himself deeper in the buzzing crowd, intercalating between strangers, people that he didn’t know, people who couldn’t embarrass him by knowledge of Karkat. Then suddenly he heard familiar voices, and quickly crammed himself behind a broad-shouldered guy, shielding himself from view. He could just see a metallic glint and a shock of long, wild hair over his shoulder, and then someone slunk out of the way, and he eyed Vriska and Sollux, engaged in what looked like lively debate.

He didn’t _mean_ to overhear the conversation, but he just about did, because Dave had let the music drop to a chill drumbeat.

“What the hell is _with_ you lately, Sollux?” Vriska demanded, flexing her mechanical arm, a beer can buckling against the fingers of her other hand.

“Nothing,” Sollux grunted back, and Vriska snorted.

“Is it Ampora? Jesus, Sollux, get a grip already.”

“It’th nothing to do with you, Vrithka, so just butt out!”

“Whatever. He’s not the only one around here with dashing good looks and buttfuckloads of charm.”

“Thorry, I’m not into borderline-homicidal chicks.”

“What the fuck, I wasn’t talking about _me_ you fucking –”

John elected to stop listening, and he kept struggling on until he reached the bar. He was sweating under the collar a little by now, and it was nice to breathe air that wasn’t so thick with… pheromones. He spotted Aradia in an instant, sitting at the corner and tapping the beat of the music on the rim of her wine glass. Slotting in between her and the guy another stool down, John raised his hand in greeting.

“Oh, hello, John,” Aradia said, staring into the puddle left at the bottom of her glass. In sharp and upsetting contrast to everyone else he’d seen tonight, she didn’t look like she was having a good time at all. Even in this cheery and warm light she looked washed-out, ashen and small; the heavy bags under her eyes were fever-red and her eye makeup, usually so intricately and elegantly applied tonight was smudged and worn; John would have thought she’d fallen asleep wearing it, but it didn’t look like she’d been sleeping at all.

It felt quieter over here, sadder, like this was the part where the glitz and glamour had chipped away like so much caked-on makeup, powdering into dust and eyelashes falling. Here was where the corners of the room dimmed, and the lanternlight ebbed and flickered with the quiet muffled thrum of the music, and they both watched the wine puddle move, sluggish, as Aradia tilted her glass by the stem.

“How are you holding up, Aradia?” he said. The corners of her scarlet-stained lips twitched just a fraction, like she was trying, but there was a weight holding them down. “Not good, huh?”

“Not good,” she said softly, looking up at him from under clumped lashes. After a moment, she said, “I would like to go home, but.”

She looked ashamed of herself after she’d said it, like there was a guilt holding her back, like she thought she knew she should’ve been laughing, dancing, stringing up the corners of that false smile, but she just _couldn’t_.

“But?”

“There are so many people around, and…”

“You don’t want to walk on your own?” he guessed, and she nodded, sighing. He understood. “Hey, it’s okay, I can walk you back if you want.”

“Oh, John, you don’t have to… don’t let me ruin your night.”

“Hey, come on,” John said, laying his hand gently over hers. “Let’s get out of here, okay?”

“Alright.”

Karkat wasn’t here, and Aradia’s happiness was the most important thing of all.

* * *

He didn’t understand.

The night had started so well and it was so full of promise and warmth. Now he held a twice-broken Aradia in his arms, but this time she didn’t cry. Not a drop.

They had taken advantage of the fact that it was a Friday night, and Friday nights in the Lower City were an _institution_ , and in between all the noise and the light nobody would notice a handful of housebreakers filtering in through the grates, it wasn’t like anyone would’ve been watching Aradia’s street, anyway, everyone was out drinking and laughing and they would have met no resistance whatsoever. John could trace the route they’d taken because it was spelled out for him as he climbed the stairs: it was one flight up and through the first door and she’d just been unlucky because it wasn’t like she hadn’t locked it, she _had_.

Aradia didn’t tell him any of this. She just sat in his arms on her sofa.

He could see that it would’ve been a cosy and eclectically-decorated place, once, this tiny little apartment, every corner and surface alight with glistening ornaments and tealights burning low in their well-loved holders. There was even a trace of incense still left in the air, spiced orange and cut with the familiar scent of Aradia’s hair. But now there were just blank spaces, a shadowless dim light that swelled into corners because everything was gone. Even the curtains.

And the floor was covered in paper and shards of things Aradia had once owned. They’d ripped the place apart looking to milk it for all it was worth, take everything she had to call hers and leave her without a safe home and nothing to her name. All she had any more was the dress that she was wearing. John felt weirdly like he was watching all of this happen from somewhere overhead, like his brain hadn’t quite sewn together the reality of what he was seeing, and the way he felt about it. Pointless anger that had no outlet and he couldn’t redirect. At himself; at these nameless faceless strangers, too, that had taken a shattered woman and done their best to grind her into nothing.

Dust danced in their breaths. Aradia shifted her head an inch, pulling her eyes from John’s shoulder to turn them to the room, moving the bareness into her field of view. John didn’t speak, but he left his arms around her, stared too with her as she looked around, but he didn’t know what this place had looked like before. He didn’t have to sit and trace the outlines of all the things that had been taken, he had no need to wonder if he’d ever be able to get them back, or replace them, things that were personal, things that meant something, maybe gifts, things he’d loved. And it wasn’t fair.

“Why me?” she said softly, her words falling into the stale air, and John had no answer. There was _no answer_. She had done nothing to deserve this; Aradia had always been gentle and kind, he’d always thought her a star, brighter than lanternlight and purer than ice. They’d ripped into her in the worst ways.

“I can try and find the people who did it,” John murmured, screwing his eyes shut behind his glasses. He could, he really could try. “I can try and get… some stuff back.”

He felt inadequate and awkward. He was the practical type, and somehow making plans to do anything right now felt wrong, jarring, against the rawness of Aradia’s grief. He knew it, because she just pressed her lips together, straining them at the corners. But then she nodded.

“I don’t think it’s a good idea to stay here tonight,” John said, continuing to feel like an asshole. She just nodded, again, eyes still dry and staring endlessly. The only person that he knew for sure would be at home was… Karkat.

Sometimes, John really wanted to punch himself in the face. This was one of those moments.

“You wanna stay with…”

“Karkat?” Aradia supplied from knowing him only too well, still staring opposite at the empty fireplace. He was predictable. He was pathetic. He wanted to point out that he had no ulterior motives, when he realised it didn’t even matter anyway, all that mattered was that Aradia was put up somewhere safe for the night, and he could dredge through the fact that he was a terrible fucking human later. This, here, mattered now.

“Yeah. I didn’t see him tonight so I guess he’s still at home.”

She pulled away from him, and John could literally watch as she pulled fragments of herself back together, smoothing the lines in her brow, twitching the taper of her lips until her expression settled back to neutrality; even the gloss of her eyes returned as she blinked, forcing them back into focus, crimson irises flashing. She tucked a curl of hair behind her ear absently, running its length between her fingertips. She was an actress, and he, a fool.

“I expect that he is,” she said, and it was like hearing a void. Passionless and drained. Exhausted. He could only hope that Karkat would be able to put something back of Aradia, because John was useless. He was muscle and that was all.

“I’ll… I’ll walk you, if you want,” John said, and Aradia bit her lip.

“Yes, yes, you want to see Karkat,” she said, and again, that overwhelming urge to smack himself. He didn’t want to contradict her, didn’t want to start an argument with her in this bleak and barren place, but it _wasn’t like that_. And yet he was the one who’d let it seem like it did.

“Let’s go, then,” Aradia intoned, dully as the dust floating around them. They stood, and Aradia led the way without even a backward glance, leaving devastation yawning behind her.

* * *

He had to knock for some moments, leaving him standing awkwardly at the door with Aradia beside him, in silence. The stifled boom of the music from the club district was just audible from this part of town, and sewn together with the sound of moths frying themselves on the buzzing corridor lamps, it was enough to set John’s teeth on edge. Would Aradia even be safe here at all? She’d been unlucky, maybe Karkat would be, too, maybe someone would make them victims again tonight.

He knocked again, more urgently, and this time Karkat answered, flinging the door open wide-eyed and tense; he relaxed, visibly, shoulders slackening once he realised that these callers weren’t enemies.

“What’s going on?” he said, looking from John to Aradia. “Jesus, Aradia, what happened?”

In front of Karkat, Aradia could cry. She stumbled forwards into him and he caught her like the rock that he was, wrapping his arms around her waist instantly. She was a head taller than him, easily, especially in her heels, and it was tragic and beautiful and John could only hover on the edge of this, watching from the outside, because he didn’t really belong and he shouldn’t have _wanted_ to. Sooner or later he’d have to sever the lines between his heart and his brain. They were bad strategy.

“Come on,” Karkat said, muffled into Aradia’s neck, and he took her firmly by the hand and led her into his apartment. Not sure of where to put himself, but noting that Karkat left the door open, he followed them inside, swinging it shut behind him. Karkat was leading Aradia into his bedroom, and with the implicit assumption that he was not invited, John set himself down on Karkat’s couch, and waited.

He couldn’t hear whatever conversation was taking place in there, but he caught the tones. Distress and heartache and a soothing, comforting thrum, the sound of Karkat knowing what to say, the sound of Karkat being trusted and important. They’d known each other for years. John was an interloper, an intrusion, an ugly stain on the honest and exposed love that lived here. He stared out of the window, desperate for something to put his eyes on, and saw only the emerald flare of the lantern over the bar opposite. You’d never see that colour in the Upper City, they’d never have it, and it was funny, it was funny because this wasn’t where John was supposed to be, this wasn’t John being useful, this was John being a sentimental moron and trying to shove himself places he didn’t belong, this was John letting terrible things happen because he wasn’t paying attention, because he felt things he shouldn’t, because he didn’t think, he never could –

Bec was there. Bec. Good dog. Bec whose owner had been thrown in prison because John was too slow and too dumb. But the dog had no grudge against him; he lay his enormous head in John’s lap and blinked yellow diamonds up at him, swooshing his tails slowly and breathing like a whistle. John patted the top of the dog’s head. 

“What are you doing here, pup?” John said, and Bec lifted a paw and placed it on John’s thigh. He’d been looking after Karkat. He was no ordinary good dog. He was a miracle of a simple little thing.

Eventually, he heard Karkat’s bedroom door click shut, and he turned his head to see Karkat standing in front of it, looking pale and worried and drawn. It was a look John was starting to characterise him by.

“You’re still here,” Karkat observed, crossing the room to busy himself with drawing the curtains. It looked an awful lot like an excuse to avoid looking at him, because Karkat didn’t usually give a fuck if those curtains were open or closed.

“You can’t stay,” Karkat said.

John suddenly realised that he had assumed he’d be staying the night. He had assumed… that Karkat would have wanted him to.

“Oh. Um, yeah, okay. Sure,” John stammered, waving Bec away as he stood abruptly, half in a daze, and crossed the room. He made it only part of the way to the door before he turned around, only to see again the back of Karkat’s head, silhouetted against the green light of the window pane. “I can protect you, you know, for tonight –”

“That’s what the dog is for,” Karkat interrupted him, coldly, and Bec pointed all of his yellow eyes in John’s direction, blinking slowly. “Go home.”

It crystallised, then, that this was not where he was supposed to be. Karkat knew. He wouldn’t let John waste another second shirking his responsibilities to them for anyone’s sake, not even his own. It made sense, it was sharp as glass in his mind, and yet it was painful as anything, and John wasn’t usually in the business of feeling sorry for himself, but this time it hurt.

“ _John,_ ” Karkat snapped. “Get out of here already.”

He swung the curtain shut with a violent swish of fabric and clatter of curtainhooks, and John nodded, spat out an _uh-right-okay-see-you_ and turned on his heel, and left as quick as he could, out of the building and onto the street, out of the street and into the passageways, out of the passageways and into the twists of the Brume, out of the Brume and through the gates and down amber-glazed streets he knew better than the backs of his hands, and finally into his tiny apartment. Its cold sparseness had nothing on the warmth of Karkat’s arms.

But he had nothing to do there, tonight.

 _Get over yourself,_ he mentally hissed at the loser in the mirror, as he loosened his bowtie, slackened his bootlaces, kicked off his clothes and then stood half-dressed and pathetic, just watching himself. There was too much behind his eyes to dissect, far too much going on, at any gviven moment he was lying to at least _someone_ and he couldn’t afford to let his feelings filter in there too and start throwing all of these complicated lives out of balance, couldn’t let anything get under his skin because it’d tamper with the plan. He watched his breaths. Tight and pinched up near his collarbones.

They had almost told each other the truth, the other night. Jade would have liked it. She really would’ve. But she was wrong about this one thing.

He could turn their sand timer over. He could tie this thing back together. They were only doomed if he let himself slip, and getting too emotionally invested in Karkat definitely counted as slipping. He was a beautiful, red distraction, and John had to put it out of his mind or he’d kill all of them.

His Lamplighter jacket was hanging on his closet door; he ran his thumb over the cool metal of his name label, grounding himself in the present, in his self. He was more useful to them here than he ever could be there.

John Egbert.

Standard Rank Lamplighter.

He’d been playing by the wrong rules, before, letting his heart lead, leaving his cards lying on the table. He couldn’t afford to be stupid about it, not any more, not now that things were getting worse. There was still time to scrape it back together. He could still do his best for them.

He would.


	14. Wrecking Ball Heart

**Notes for the Chapter:**

>  **Trigger warnings:** Guns, graphic violence, needles

“Hey, John. Can you get me a pen?”

“A pen? Here’s one.”

“I like the green ones! I don’t wanna write in blue, it’s stupid.”

“How old are you?”

“Old enough to know what I want!”

Chuckling, John gently cuffed her cheek. This was a re-hash of a playful conversation they’d had a million times before, but now it was in a dingy little jail cell under the whip and hum of a fluorescent bar lamp. It lit up the cobwebs and turned them angel-white. She even had a little window, half a foot’s view onto the courtyard below.

“Do you even have paper?” he said, and her eyes narrowed conspiratorially behind her huge glasses, which she pushed up her snub nose.

“Don’t worry about that! Just get me a pen, okay?”

“Sure. Whatever the lady wants,” John said, grinning as she clapped her hands together. Jade smiled so easily. And she was like a heat lamp. No matter how ripped apart he felt, her warmth would always reach him somehow. She’d found him in some bad places before, too. This was one of them.

“Who are you writing to, anyway?”

He thought he had some ideas. One of them was a guy with horns twice the width of his head and a floppy mohawk.

“Who’s to say I’m writing to anyone?” she said, infuriatingly, and John rolled his eyes as he set down the towels he was still holding to his chest – the only reason he’d managed to wheedle his way in here. He wasn’t really a prison guard, after all.

“I figured that Jade Harley, of all people, wouldn’t just be doodling, or whatever,” John said, and then ruffled her hair. It’d worked a lot better when they were five years old and her hair was short, but now it was practically down to her butt and barely moved when he tried scruffing it. She yelped like a disgruntled puppy and batted his hand away, chortling in delight. “Hey, I love you,” he suddenly said, and she pointed her huge green eyes up at him.

“Well, hey, I love you too!” she giggled. “But I’m still not telling you anything!”

“It’s Tavros, isn’t it?”

Jade blanched and, pouting, she whipped away from him, staring into the corner of the room. But he could see her ears burning.

“None of your business Mr Egbert!” she said, but in half a second she was leaning back in her squeaky little wooden chair and sparkling at him through her glasses again. “But yes… I have been writing to Tavros.”

He had this familiar and distinct feeling she wasn’t telling him the whole truth, but there was no getting a secret out of Jade before it was due, so he just nodded.

“You two are… you’re cute,” he said, with a little dorky smile, flashing her his buck teeth. She shrugged.

“I like him a lot. Shame about the whole prison thing, you know!” she half-joked, but her smile wasn’t quite all there, and as he perched on the edge of her desk, his hand found her shoulder. She sighed. “But, hey, what about you and Karkat?”

The cold in the pit of his stomach started hurting him all over again. What about him and Karkat? He didn’t know. He hadn’t seen him in over a week. Hadn’t gone to the Lower City in days. He was being good. Was Karkat?

“I haven’t seen any of them in a while, uh, Karkat kinda told me to get lost, so.”

Jade looked stricken. John tried to pick up the mess he’d made.

“I’ve been busy here, you know, trying to figure out what the boss is planning and talking to people in the Bazaar, and stuff, getting a feel for the immediate dangers and… why are you looking at me like that?”

“He snapped at you once and you disappeared for a week? What are you doing?!”

“He said he didn’t need me around! And they don’t, okay? They don’t need me there! They need me here –”

“He’s probably terrified! Terrified that you’re going to get yourself killed because of him!” She’d thrown his hand off her shoulder and sprang out of her seat, stalking around the room, gesticulating furiously at him. “So of course he told you to go away, all he can keep thinking of is you lying with a bullet in your head because you were trying to protect him, because you stopped paying attention because of him! Karkat almost _never_ means what he says, don’t you know anything?!”

She feared losing Tavros, and she was angry because he was in a situation just like hers, but he had the means to do something about his feelings, and she was trapped, a spectator, powerless and waiting. He understood. He totally got everything, but still. She hadn’t seen the dead and the cold in Karkat’s eyes or the determined slant of his mouth or the way he’d so easily brushed John off.

“You’re telling me to go back?” he said, steeling himself.

“Just for a visit. You completely overreacted!”

“Okay,” he said, running a hand through his hair. Jade was always right. About everything.

“Good. Did you tell him how you feel about him, yet?”

She’d walked to him, now, standing before him, and she took his big hands in her tiny ones.

“Well, kinda,” he said, unable to repress a grin at the memory. She beamed at him.

“That’s good. That’s great, actually. You two are gonna work it out. You’re perfect.”

He just shrugged, embarrassed, and unsure.

* * *

John threw the comb at his closet mirror and stood staring at himself furiously, embarrassed of his own skin, of the look of his hair, of the cut of his shoulder, the way his coffee skin came up in a gross patchy purplish flush whenever he got upset. Like right now. Huge dewy blue eyes blinked back at him and he screwed them shut for a moment hard enough that he could see red lights popping and flaring like lamps waking up.

And then, he opened his eyes again, and as the curtains drew back he took another look, and he was painted in a light that was different, and kinder. He pulled a t-shirt over his head, straightened the hem, buttoned his jeans. He found himself shaking with a chill nervousness that he hadn’t felt in a long time. They would not want to see him, he knew, and he had almost no news to give them. He had nothing. The city underbelly was asleep and he had been grinding out his days like stones just waiting on information. But nothing… nothing had happened yet.

Something was alive in the city tonight. There was a spark in the stagnance of the dead air. He didn’t like the atmosphere one bit; it was swelling, swarming like a smoke cloud. And yet it was a conscious decision that he made when he left his guns lying on his bedside table. He never really had use for them in the Lower City… never really got shot at.

His feet carried him and he barely thought: down his apartment block’s staircase and out onto the sooty, suffocating streets, under the spill of sulphurous lamplight that was straining to pierce a thickening veil of ash and dust. And then on, boots pounding the street, splashing in slush, and down through a steaming grate into a humid stinking tunnel, following a writhing twist like slicking through a snake’s gut, and then up the rusty ladder rungs, flecks imprinting in his palms, and out, onto the streets, into the heavy neon air of the Lower City, into the light, blue and green and golden on his hair and skin, painting him peacock colour, washing him out, diluting him down. To remind him that he was small: a pawn, no knight.

And he didn’t belong here.

Just a t-shirt and jeans – he was a fool, the night was freezing and unforgiving, and the bite of the cold wet air fixed his forearms and left him shivering. His fingers numbed as he forced his feet forwards, and he flexed them, feeling the joints creak. He was older and dustier than was warranted by his twenty years, he realised, smirking grimly as he pushed his glasses up his nose from where they’d slipped on the clammy film over his face.

Quiet, now. It was no later than eight in the evening; trolls wouldn’t be out and about, not yet, but he’d go and sit in the Living Room anyway, and wait up for them, and maybe he would see Karkat, and maybe, maybe Karkat would want him, again, like he had in his fever dreams. This thought dissipated just like the phantom fog of his breath. Why did he have to love someone like Karkat? A block of ice. Sharp shattered edges, and impenetrable, and brutal and bitter and cold.

Very few things distracted John Egbert for long.

It was his extreme misfortune that, on that particular evening, on that avenue, under that exact street lamp, he was thinking of Karkat, and not paying attention.

Ah, and he had left his guns at home.

“What the fuck are you doing here?” rasped a voice, and it was a voice that he recognised, the lilt of an accent that you never ever heard outside of the Bazaar. “Are you – hey! I know you!”

Half of John said to run and the other half said to turn around, and his legs couldn’t decide what to do, so he just stopped. It was an act that he instantly regretted, about at the same time as a fist like a sledgehammer ploughed into his jaw and he staggered sideways, lights spiralling before his eyes as he crashed to the ground, and his teeth crunched down on his tongue so a long dribbly line of blood oozed down his chin and he spat blood spray everywhere, catching the stranger’s shoes, his head hit pavement and recoiled, popping something in his neck, and then he got booted in the stomach and his ribs became a vice on his lungs and all the air whistled out of him –

And he rolled over, and he forced in a breath that didn’t want to go down, and he shoved himself up with one hand and turned on his heel and threw back a punch that easily matched this guy’s force, caught him square in the centre of his chest and sent him reeling; with a quick fleeting hand, in a spare second, he wiped the blood from his face, and caught a look at the guy – he recognised him as the idiot who’d been trying to sell troll horns. His ticket to the ball at the mayor’s. Seemed like a lifetime ago, now.

“ _Egbert_ ,” the man said, and somewhere cutting through the pain and ache was a sudden jolt of terror.

He was wheezing, chuckling, clutching one arm to his chest.

“Oh, they’ll – they’ll pay me good for this.”

Lamplighters, they didn’t go to the Lower City.

Especially not out of uniform.

There were… rules.

“You’re not – you’re not gonna tell anybody,” John said, jaw twitching painfully as he weighed up his options, and then realised that there was only one. And he was unarmed.

He closed the space in between them in a matter of steps, and his punch was just a half-second faster, splattering the guy’s nose into his face, and oh, god, he was really not a fighter, the blood and the crunch and the bright red smearing up his knuckles and the copper stench pounding in waves and _pay attention for fuck’s sake_ the guy had him by the hair and shit, he was at least two, three inches taller and he was strong as hell and he was pulling, ripping his hair out by the roots, and John bent at the waist and felt his legs iron and burning and in a last-ditch effort to stay upright he flailed out with an elbow and got the guy right in the crotch which sent him barrelling backwards and howling.

And then there was the loudest sound John had ever heard, like a whip cracking against his eardrum and pain exploded in his side, worse than anything he had felt in his life, and the blood, the _blood_ , even as he crumpled to his knees he couldn’t believe the fountains pouring out of him, did humans even have that much blood in them? He was cherry red and pale-knuckled, and staring down the barrel of a gun –

Two warning shots into the air and a third that grazed the man’s thigh and he went hollering into the night, whipping around a street corner and disappearing before John or his saviour could do anything about it – what the fuck was going on – oh god, it _hurt_ – he rolled over, not recognising any of the sounds that were coming out of his mouth, little mewling things or something, strangled curses, and his heart kept on pumping and the blood just tipped right out of the hole in his side.

“Jesus fuck, John, what the fuck are you doing?!”

John groaned Karkat’s name as Karkat grabbed him by the bloodied jaw and pulled his head up from the ground. Their eyes locked, John squinting through his cracked glasses, and there was something in those red eyes staring wide and wet and worried back at him that made John’s heart collapse right through his chest wall.

The pain stamped on all his lines of judgement, ripping apart his nerves and severing all ties between his brain and his body, and he jutted his jaw upwards with a creak of the spine, and tried pressing his bloody lips up against Karkat’s – but no. Karkat had spotted the wound at his side, and turned his face at the last second so John’s lips were left grazing a little grey ear, burning hot red at the edges, and Karkat flicked his head irritably, snatched his hand back from John’s face, and shoved John’s clutched fist out of the way, peeled back the hem of his shirt, and hissed.

John tried to explain that it was fine, and actually he just wanted to kiss Karkat and be held, but instead Karkat scrambled to his feet, and John spied the gun holstered at his hip, the one that John had taught him to fire, and he smiled through the pain as Karkat dragged him to his feet and they staggered down the streets, following the familiar path that weaved to the Living Room.

Karkat would take him home.

* * *

Now he’d been placed, shirtless, on the bar. Karkat lit all the lanterns, so that a sickened sunny light flooded the room and caught every bloody angle of his body. A variety of first aid and medical implements were arranged at his side. They were alone, and John vaguely thought of silver linings, but his brain was a frazzled mess of shattered nerve endings and pain, pain bigger than the swell of his heart every time Karkat looked at him.

Warm and small hands were pressing at the wound but it couldn’t hurt more than it already did, John didn’t even flinch – but his breath did catch and hold as Karkat worked the skin, palpated the ragged flesh until the head of a bullet surfaced; he glanced down to see that Karkat’s just-cleaned hands were now painted with his blood and a bullet slipped into his fingers. He cast it aside into a little metal plate, with a clang, and then snatched up a length of bandage, dabbed it in something yellow, and held it to John’s side.

“Once the bleeding stops, you can have morphine. And you can tell me what the fuck is happening because I’m wondering when you became such a monumental fucking _idiot_.”

“Missed you,” John managed, grinning at Karkat like the doofus he was. He got a toothy scowl for his efforts, which was a better reward than expected.

The bleeding did stop, eventually, and John pressed down the bandage as Karkat readied a needle, sucking up a delicious length of clear and beautiful fluid. And then it popped into his skin, just below his palm, and he didn’t even wince, just sat back and let the waves of numbness crash over him as the pain ebbed, flowed, and dwindled down to almost-nothing.

It was a scratch. Karkat wrapped the bandage around his waist, burying the wound.

“Thanks,” John said, reaching up to wipe his face with a bloody hand, succeeding only in dirtying it further. He felt human now. Conscious. Alive. He realised he was shirtless in front of Karkat and the heat rushed to his face instantly.

“It’s what I’m here for,” Karkat grumbled, wiping the blood from John’s stomach with a warm, wet cloth. “You were lucky. The bullet got buried in your abdominal fat and didn’t pierce anything important.”

Lines of fluid trickled down his belly and buried themselves under his waistband. He couldn’t feel a thing, and he was half-upset about it. His eyes met Karkat’s, again, for a second, and then they both looked away, embarrassed.

“I just wanted to visit. Because I’ve been… away.”

Karkat said nothing, just wiped at blood smears.

“Jade told me I should. But on my way here that guy showed up. I was thinking about – uh, stuff, and he got me off guard. Realised who I was and obviously decided to try and kill me before I killed him.”

Again, silence, but now Karkat was staring at him, wide-eyed, lips parted.

“The funny part is that I forgot my guns anyway so I really would’ve been screwed without you.”

“He – he – he – you’re telling me he _knew who you were?_ ”

“Uh, yeah,” John said, biting his lip. He hadn’t been thinking on this particular detail but then it hit him hard and painful that it was kind of important.

“And he got away.”

“Well, yeah, he ran off.”

“Oh, shit,” Karkat hissed, and then threw down the cloth with a wet slap and disappeared into the back room; Bec thundered out about half a second later, giant paws scrambling, and fled the bar faster than John had ever seen him move. Karkat emerged, looking stricken and terrified, and normally he had everything so under control that John couldn’t believe it.

“I – what’s the problem? I can go back and deal with it –”

He had guns, after all.

“John, do you really think you’re in a position to murder anyone?! Are you actually fucking brainless or do you just enjoy making everyone think you are?”

“Why the fuck are you always such an ass to me?!” John snapped, and regretted it instantly, but the anger and the hurt just spilled out. “I can take care of him, and no one has to find out.”

“Except for the fact that the Lamplighters _always find out_ , and you’re a hamfisted idiot who can’t do anything right!” Karkat roared back, but all the same he snatched up the cloth and jabbed at John’s chest with it.

“Well what are you going to do about it? You’re going to send a troll into the city to handle this? I won’t let you.”

“No, that is _not_ what I was going to do,” Karkat growled, wiping a spatter of blood from John’s chin. “Look, just let me handle it, okay? I can’t even explain right now.”

“Where did you send Bec?” John demanded, and Karkat’s eyes narrowed.

“Vriska. Feferi. Eridan.”

“And they’ll know what to do?”

“Yes.”

“Okay.” A pause. “I’m sorry I always screw up.”

The cloth once again hit the countertop, and Karkat laid his damp palms on John’s shoulders. Their eyes met, again, and this time Karkat was electric, furious, alive.

“I don’t pity you, Egbert. My life is in your fucking hands and if you fumble it one more time you’re going to kill us. Do you understand?”

“Yeah. I get it. I… yeah. I’m an idiot, like you were saying.”

“You’re not an idiot. That’s the thing. You’re just acting like a braindead fuckhole. So stop that.”

“You got it,” John said, and then, without thinking, he put his arms around Karkat’s waist and pulled him in, so Karkat leaned awkwardly into the bar in between his legs, sputtering something about boundaries, but it took him just a moment to relax, to let it happen, and he curled his arms around John’s neck, and John shuddered at the warmth, at the tenderness he’d been missing so much. He could barely feel a thing because his blood was a morphine syrup but he knew that Karkat was there, and that was about enough.

And then the door boomed open and Karkat flew away from him like John had burned him. Vriska bristled through, crossed the room, pushed Karkat aside and, hands on hips, stood before John, and inspected him.

“What the fuck happened here?” she demanded, flicking the bandage at John’s waist with a metallic finger.

“I got shot,” John said, and she rolled her eyes.

“No shit,” she drawled. “By who? When? And what’s it got to do with me?”

“Some guy from the city. Who identified him. _By name._ And he’s right now running off to tell everyone that he found John Egbert skulking around here out of uniform and unarmed,” Karkat said, and John had to rip his eyes away from Vriska because the way that the rage built in her eyes and the furrows of her scowl actually terrified him. Her jaw jumped, her eyes bugged, her breath came in a pained hiss from her nostrils.

“Are… you… fucking… _KIDDING ME?_ ” she exploded, flinging her hands in the air, all of her mess of hair moving as she genuinely stamped her foot in dismay. Karkat folded his arms, and she directed her venomous attention to John.

“What are you always doing around here, anyway? You never even actually _help_ , all you can do is pick up the pieces after everything gets fucked up when you could be in the Upper City actually doing something useful!”

Karkat did not rise to his defence; instead, he sank down onto a barstool, running a hand through his hair. Vriska jabbed her metallic finger into John’s sternum with enough force to bruise.

“This is because of your pathetic little thing for _him_ , isn’t it? Well guess what, you fucking loser? Karkat’s not the only one with their life on the line! You are our only link to the Lamplighters and the government, and if you’re not going to take it seriously then you might as well not even fucking bother, because you’re no use to us unless you’re paying some fucking attention to what your boss and your colleagues are doing!”

The curl on her blue lips told John that she wasn’t done yet. Awkward silence punctuated, before she went on.

“There’s nothing you can do here that we can’t do ourselves. Do you understand? You can’t even help us without risking giving yourself away. We don’t need you here. We need you in the Upper City. We need you looking after Jade and keeping an eye out for any sign that the government’s gonna crack down on us. No matter what happens here, _we_ can handle it. Got it, moron?”

“Yeah. Yeah, I understand.”

“Good! Finally something’s penetrated your thick fucking skull!” she screeched, batting him around the ear with a cold, hard hand. “Now listen. I am going to sort this giant fucking mess out. You are going to fuck _off_ back to the Upper City and do something that is actually useful, and try not to get fired or murdered in the time it takes us to fix this!”

Her cheeks were coloured, bright blue, and her chest heaved with fury. Beside him, Karkat had readied pen and paper, and John couldn’t help but wonder what for – but it was none of his business. As was becoming swiftly apparent. He pulled his shirt back over his head, smoothed it down over his gunshot wound, and stared at Vriska.

“When are Feferi and Eridan gonna be here?” she snapped at Karkat.

“Soon, hopefully.”

“God, we’re so fucked… I hope he remembers how much he owes me,” Vriska snarled, rubbing her temples.

“Vriska, can you remember who’s here, _please?_ ” Karkat growled, waving a hand in John’s direction. More secrets.

“Should I just go?” John said, pushing himself down from the bar and trying to not sound like a petulant child. She was right. This was his fault and he was stupid.

“Wait,” Vriska said quickly, and turned to him, a wicked grin blossoming on her mouth. The same one he’d seen that time she tried to shoot him in the head. “There’s something else.”

“What?”

“I just think you should know this, you know, because I’m your friend, and I care about you,” she said, and John could feel his heart drop. “The night you left Aradia at Karkat’s apartment –”

“Vriska,” Karkat hissed, a warning. But she did not heed it.

“What? What happened?” John said, voice cracking.

“Vriska, he doesn’t need to know –”

“Doesn’t he?! God, Egbert, I fucking pity you, sometimes. How long were you gonna string him along, Karkles?”

“Shut the fuck up! John, go home.”

“Tell me,” John insisted, and Karkat huffed in frustration, pushing both his hands up through his hair.

“Karkat kissed Aradia,” Vriska said, flippantly, like it was practically nothing.

And it was.

To _her_.

Karkat was determinedly not looking in his direction. John pressed his lips together for a second, and then shrugged, managed to choke out something that sounded like “So what?” and then turned on his heel and left the Living Room completely. He hit the streets, shaking like a bomb about to go off, and forced his numb legs to carry him.

He hadn’t made it to the street corner before he heard –

“John! John, wait up, for _fuck’s_ sake –”

John thought of every crappy romance novel he’d ever flicked through at Karkat’s apartment, or had thrust into his face by that little fucking asshole, and his heart throbbed and he almost turned around. Almost realised that he was becoming a cliché; the hero of his own pointless story – that he was the one he’d always mentally scream at in the books, _turn around turn around it’s not really what you think_ , and that Karkat was in the wrong but it was a misunderstanding, a mistake, John really needed to hear what he had to say because it wouldn’t be as bad as it seemed. And they would have a happy ending.

“Stop acting so fucking precious and turn around!”

John could practically _taste_ the regret that caught Karkat after that sentence. So it was his fault, then, and he was overreacting. He was stupid to think that he and Karkat were anything, meant anything, anything that was more important than Karkat getting to kiss a pretty girl.

Oh, hell.

He did try, though, he did stop at the street corner, he did throw a half-glance over his shoulder but to see that stormy little man making moony eyes at the back of his head just made him feel sick. He couldn’t. There was too much hurt. Whatever explanation Karkat had for this, he didn’t want to hear it; he never wanted to know.

“I’m going home,” John informed him, choking on the last syllable. He didn’t really cry and this time was no exception, but his heart felt like it had been slashed in two and he couldn’t shake the image of Karkat’s hands tangled in Aradia’s hair or her painted lips on his. She was so beautiful. She was worth so much more than he would ever be. It made sense. Karkat wanted Aradia, John wanted Karkat, and nobody wanted John.

Karkat didn’t follow him.

* * *

He hadn’t gone home, really. His feet instead had walked him to the Athenaeum, to the diamond of beautiful grass, and he sat on a park bench facing the jade lady, who smiled apologetic and unmoving down at him, pouring out her line of bubbling water. She, of all people, would not judge him. The night was silent save for the froth of the fountain, as it ever was this late in the Upper City; people slept, and if they were awake then they’d be in a busier district at a bar or a club, not here in the dozing library ward. It was him alone, and the jade statue, under the willow trees that cut the lanternlight with green warmth.

As he breathed, he listened. Each breath stretched the wound at his side and it was strange because he could feel the skin stress but he felt no pain, just comfortable, numb, morphine emptiness. There was a wheeze and then a rush as the air poured out of him. Everything was still ticking and turning like clockwork, even as his heart flaked off in pieces.

Aradia.

He didn’t blame her; he couldn’t. She had been so broken and so hurt and Karkat was _there_ and John knew exactly how wonderfully warm and comforting Karkat could be, when he wanted to, and how easy it was to fall into him. He always knew just what to say and his strong hands could piece together anything, no matter how cracked. John wondered what Karkat would make of his broken heart, if he could hold it now. He’d certainly patched up the bullet wound just fine.

The gunshot… John’s head hurt with the weight of the hundreds of things he had to think on, and he gripped the dewy wood of the bench, sighing the heavy, leaden air. Vriska had told him she would fix things – but he had to wonder exactly what she’d do. There were secrets that he wasn’t to know. Machinations and cogs turning behind veils that he just had to _trust_ would put him right in the end.

“Everything will be okay,” he said, scuffing his feet in the ankle-length grass and looking up at the jade lady, who just kept on smiling back at him. She knew it, too. This tangled web would right itself in the end.

And he just had to keep going through the motions. His next shift was six a.m..


	15. No Man Is An Island

**Notes for the Chapter:**

>  **Trigger warnings:** Vomiting, one mention of parental death

Dust in the dim green light floated like fireflies waiting, and colours and shapes and half-formed things moved in the space behind John’s eyes. Sipping the warm syrup of the air he lay, and felt his muscles unravel, his back arch and lengthen again, and blankets ribboned over his toes and rippled the lengths of his arms. A murmur, a whisper, the hum of a bottle green lamp, and a cascade of glitter shimmering, and John was enchanted, again. Whisked away. The world was a halcyon blur, and it rested with him.

As did Karkat.

It was quite sudden, that realisation: oh, there you are, again, little man. On the other side of the bed, flat on his back, grey collarbones daubed with that rich honey-emerald light. He was champagne eyes and wine-red irises, the deepest crow-feather-black hair, and a pop of candycorn brightness. All the colours. He was a palette. John wanted to paint himself red. And then he looked again, gave himself the permission he needed to trace the lines of Karkat’s perfect, tight angles, his lines and his flats and his rounds and smooths. They were undressed.

John moved first, to press his fingers against Karkat’s waist, and Karkat unwound, turning his head, lengthening his neck; John watched the supple skin stretch and tug over the points of his collarbones and bit his lip. Fingers moved and swept lines, and they moved closer, and a warmth bloomed between them.

“You brought me home,” John said, staring at the hollow of Karkat’s neck.

This was Karkat’s bed. It was his musky, smoky scent that sugared these sheets – that set John’s heart pounding in earnest. To be alone with him was… something.

“Yes.”

“And you didn’t kiss Aradia.”

“No.”

Truths, white and light, settled on the crest of his consciousness, and put him to rest. All was well. He grinned from ear to ear and Karkat smiled back at him, then slipped shut those beautiful eyes, and John wrapped an arm around his shoulders and snatched him in, to face him. They were chest-to-chest. John counted his breaths and then took a leap.

“You know, you never kissed me, either…”

Big red moons locked with him again, and there was that sickle-sharp smirk, the points of a couple snaggly teeth, and he felt uncomfortable heat creeping his back.

Oh, but it was simple.

Their lips touched and it was warmth, and calm, and quiet, and so small and fragile, and those pinprick tingles raced down his spine and he grinned into it, sappy as ever, hand holding the base of Karkat’s back, thumbing the cool skin, but he found he wasn’t sure what to do apart from that – his choreography was all wrong, he couldn’t quite match Karkat’s movements but to feel the little hot wetness was enough. Karkat didn’t kiss like Eridan, was the thing, that was why it was hard.

John wasn’t too sure what Karkat _did_ kiss like.

Actually… he couldn’t feel much of anything at all.

It was all hollow, then, and everything fell apart.

* * *

When he woke, he found himself holding a pillow to his chest, all four limbs wrapped hard around it. A dream; it all flooded back in a torrent of ice, that he’d been shot, that Karkat and Vriska had to save him, and that Karkat had kissed Aradia, and he would never ever kiss John. The morphine, also, had worn off, and a pain rawer than anything his heart could feel started grating his side – he groaned and flung the pillow across the room, then grabbed the covers and pulled them up over his head, and held his knees.

Then his stomach turned. Again he groaned, more desperately, as his fingertips pushed the skin of his belly, and that all too horribly familiar feeling grasped his insides in clammy fists and twisted, and bile swelled and a cold sweat prickled over his upper lip and he felt his tongue recede and his throat spasm, and a knife of hot urgency ripped its way up from his stomach to the back of his mouth; he staggered out of bed, dropping covers and sheets, and went for the bathroom but crashed to the ground after half a step.

Panting, hissing, with a sting in the back of his throat and a pain whose throb was becoming irrepressible, John dragged himself with white knuckles and flailing legs to the bathroom, where he curled around the toilet bowl and shook, and wondered what the fuck he had done wrong to deserve to feel so wretched and pathetic.

The bare lightbulb overhead hummed and flickered and watched him.

When Karkat had been sick, with his fever puke and shaking hallucinations, John had been there to hold his trembling shoulders, smooth down his mat of hair, stroke his horns until he’d sleep again. Where was Karkat now? The sadness brewed in his gut and thrashed and frothed and a pain stabbed in time with his racing heart, and he gagged, but nothing came up, and the storm rumbled and he shuddered, lay his head on the toilet seat, and waited. What was this? A morphine hangover? He’d never felt so wrecked.

Another wave of nausea crashed over him, but it passed without incident, and the minutes oozed by.

He found himself grasping at his stomach. Get out get out get out.

He wanted it all gone everything all the hurt, and the needling sadness.

His gunshot wound sparked with shearing pain and John gulped, gasped, choked on his breath, and retched, throat scraping like sandpaper, but still, nothing. He was ready to burst into tears and run howling to his dad, but dad was dead. Something twisted behind his ribs and he heaved on a sob, and _then_ it came, the first relief he’d felt in days, everything spattered out of him and he watched it disappear.

He wiped off his mouth and slumped sideways, cracking his head on the tiles. His alarm had started blaring in the other room. He was breathing quicker than he should’ve, rasping the stale air. His stomach had settled, though, and while he was beaded with sweat and couldn’t control his tremors, he would be okay.

* * *

A week crawled by without so much as a note from anybody. This afternoon, though, English wanted to see him, and that was terrifying.

Presently he stood outside his boss’ office, trying not to shake, keeping his cool under his neat and official façade; he smoothed the lapel on his jacket and did his best to not think of what might happen if Vriska hadn’t fixed things for him. He swallowed a hard lump of fear and looked up at the hanging lantern lighting the corridor, and his fingers scraped on the hardwood wall behind him. He steadied his hands, clasped them behind his back, and tapped his foot exactly twice before the office door swung open.

“Egbert. Come in,” English gruffed, and John hesitated for a second, before following his boss into his office. English took a seat behind his polished oak desk, and gestured bluntly for John to sit across from him, which he did.

The place was in more disarray than John was used to. Papers were stacked not only on the desk but on almost all available surfaces; every bookshelf was crammed with folders and even the floor was covered with sheaves of strewn case files and snippets of laws new and old. Thick dust floated in the air, lit up by the lamplight wavering in from the large circular window opposite: the contents of the office had been recently searched through, then, and from the distressed furrow in English’s brow, he had something to say about all of this.

“How are you feeling?” his boss said, and John stared blankly at him for a second, wracking his brain for an appropriate answer. “You look like shit. And you have been acting like a fool.”

Ah. He had noticed. John had been staggering around doing a piecemeal job on the day of his horrific morphine incident, and even after that the gunshot wound had been jabbing misery at him at odd intervals, so he’d do stupid things like drop lanterns or nearly set the cuffs of his jacket on fire.

“I’m okay, boss, really,” John said. “Just a migraine, you know. It’s, uh, much better now.”

English nodded. “Good,” he said, and then flicked his eyes to the floor, settling critically on a wedge of papers. “I apologise for the mess.”

“What happened? If I can ask,” John said, adjusting his glasses and peering at English. This wasn’t much like him. He was usually anally retentive about organisation around this place, especially his own office.

“It is a long story,” English huffed, but he gave a strained smile all the same as he rubbed a temple. “I will indulge you.”

John leaned forwards, one brow quirked with just the right measure of curiosity that his boss wouldn’t find him suspicious.

“As you know. We cannot act without the mayor’s permission,” English said, and John nodded. This was simple stuff that he’d learned in his orientation classes. “I have several irons in the fire. She is reluctant to agree with me.”

English cast his eyes around again. “Usually I would not scrounge around so desperately. But I am tired of her always getting her way.”

“What have you done?” John said, with a sly little smile, and English tried to smile back.

“I was sure. That there was some law or loophole. That I could use. To tell her to shove it.”

That did not sound good.

“Did you find one?”

Sighing, English leaned back in his chair, and tented his fingers on the desk. The shadows moved over his face and etched deeper rings under his eyes.

“Not yet.”

“Sorry for asking, boss, but what did you want to do?”

Eyes narrowed for a fraction of a second in his direction, and John’s shoulders tensed, but then English answered him.

“My sister is soft and weak,” he said, curt and aggrieved. “She will not license institutional violence against the trolls. I dislike it.”

“Why?”

“She is making me look weak. She is trying. To publicly humiliate me. I will not allow her to question our authority.”

John swallowed. “Do you think she’ll change her mind?”

“Calliope? No. She is stubborn and stupid,” English said lowly, with the slightly deranged lilt of a man hellbent on something. “But she has the arm. So she has the power. And we defer to her.”

John knew that Darkhaven was governed by technocracy, but political games made his head hurt, most of the time. Whoever had the best tech was obliged to rule, but that meant that Calliope’s arm…

“Is her arm really the best there is?” John said, a little perturbed. He’d seen machines bigger and badder than her arm, but the set of English’s jaw answered the question before he even spoke.

“Yes. Its progenitor. Was widely celebrated. No engineer can do what he did. But he will not cooperate with our regime.”

“Who made the arm?” John asked immediately, and then caught himself, and added, “Gosh, this is a lot of questions. Sorry, boss.”

“He is imprisoned under our control. No matter what we put him through. He refuses to cooperate. But he is too valuable to kill,” English said, ducking his chin and glowering intensely across at him. “Calliope stole the arm. When the engineer was arrested. She has always been. Under-handed and sneaky.”

John took in a sharp breath.

“Can’t anyone build something better?” he said, and English just shook his head.

“It is a beautiful machine. I am sure that you will see it up close. One day soon,” English said, and then their eyes met in a way that John couldn’t help but feel was extremely significant. He pressed his lips together. “John. You should know. I trust you very much.”

“Yes. Thanks, boss. It means a lot.”

“Good. You are a good soldier,” English said, and John grinned abashedly, hating himself because it wasn’t true. He was all bad and his brain was a mess, but he was the best pretender around. “You may leave.”

* * *

This day had been the slowest so far, even with the brief excitement in his boss’ office earlier. He wasn’t even sure what to conclude from it – his brain buzzed with the static of a thousand thoughts as he traipsed through the alleyways of the Brume, cutting a quick soot-marked path back towards the Barracks. Lanternlight trickled down to paint his weary shoulders and he rolled them, to try and shake off the stubborn ache, but it wasn’t going anywhere fast. He half-wanted to go to Karkat and ask him to repay the backrub favour, and yet, he so didn’t want that. The thought of seeing him again made his stomach squirm.

John was not Aradia, and he was no replacement, either. Nor was he Dave or Eridan or Terezi. He was in no position to expect to be wanted by Karkat, of all people, who was himself perfect, and was probably now lying in his bed with someone beautiful and interesting and not in the least dorky or awkward or, or, dumb, someone who always knew the right thing to say and never let themselves get hurt, someone who didn’t trust so easy and didn’t get their heart stomped on all the time, someone who didn’t have to pretend all of the hurt away because they were brave enough to face it on their own!

He stopped, quite suddenly, between two lamps, and the in-between darkness only bothered him more; his lungs pumped the smoke-filled air hard and fast and his hands balled into fists at the thoughts batting around in his brain. He felt ill and tired and sad and he wanted to crawl into bed and never resurface.

Then, though, there was a sudden movement near the top of his field of vision, a black shape flitting into the lanternlight and then away, again, quickly – he squinted up into the dark and he could just see it moving. It was probably just a moth – no, there it was again, and it was certainly bigger than a moth, but too indistinct. He stepped into the lantern’s puddle of murky light and adjusted his glasses, only to find that the thing had come to a stop, resting on the lantern’s wall bracket. He picked out the details of its silhouette.

Four tiny paws, and a pair of dark eyes that shined like beetles in the light. It looked like someone’s cat, but cats didn’t usually flap around – and then he saw the bat wings, tucked against its sides, and it made sudden sense.

“Jaspers?”

He hadn’t seen this cat for about five years; he had belonged to Rose’s mom, and one day Rose’s mom had just disappeared, and Jaspers had disappeared too. He was surprised that the cat was even still alive; it was like seeing a ghost, but then again, like Bec he was a phenomenon outside the realms of known zoology, an alchemical cat-beast rather than a standard housecat. Jaspers tilted his tiny head to look down on John, and mewled. It was then that John noticed that the cat had a note tucked under his collar. A message for someone?

He tried not to think about curiosity and how it tended to kill cats, and he reached up a hand.

“C’mere, little guy,” he cooed, and Jaspers stared at him. Much like Bec, he was kind of a doofus – at least as far as John remembered. The cat meowed again, and John beckoned him with a finger. “Come down here, Jaspers. It’s me, John, remember?”

This time Jasper’s tiny meow was strangled with excitement, and with a rearrangement of paws and a preparatory butt-shake, the cat launched itself down into John’s waiting arms. On instinct, he cradled Jaspers like a baby and rocked him against his chest. He really was just a tiny ball of fur, dwarfed completely by John in his imperious Lamplighter uniform.

“Good kitty.”

Jaspers rubbed his drooly cheek up against John’s lapels, and John chuckled for the first time in a while, the sound startling the both of them.

“Now, can I read this?” he said, figuring it was probably polite to ask first, as he dug his fingers under Jaspers’ collar.

Much to his surprise, Jaspers reacted less than pleasantly. One paw shot up, claws out, and batted him right in the eye, and John squawked and almost dropped him – his wings were unfurled now and beating furiously in John’s arms, and the cat wriggled and howled and hissed and managed to flip himself upside down between John’s elbows –

“Give me that you – ugh – Jaspers – you are a cat you can’t win this – nope nope nope –”

He got four kicks in the face for his troubles, but after another moment, he’d managed to wrest the note out from the cat’s collar. Jaspers flitted around his head, furious and aggrieved, as he unfolded it – he used one hand to pap the cat away, as gently as he could while avoiding serious injury, and scanned the note twice, quickly.

_Vriska,_   
_My goodness, what a surprise it was to hear from you again! It seems like its been lifetimes since those nights we owned the city, doesnt it? Ah, to be young again, and for life to be one adventure after another…_

_As usual i find myself unable to, as you so wonderfully put it, shut the hell up and get to the point. I suppose ill spare you the blathering and tell you that the point, in this case, is that i have taken care of the ruffian you tasked me with. Just like old times._

_Take care,_   
_J_

Whoever J was, John owed him a hell of a lot.

He re-folded the note swiftly and shook it in Jasper’s face – “Here, look, you can have it back!” – before tucking it securely back under his collar. Jaspers seemed soothed by this, as he took up a perch on John’s shoulder, craning his neck down to shove his nose into John’s stinging, scratched ear. John tried to think, but found that the drooling face stuffed into the side of his head was more than just a little distracting.

“Jaspers, why is everybody keeping secrets from me?” he said, and Jaspers purred wetly into his ear. “I bet you’d tell me the truth. If you could.”

The burning cuts on his face and hands suggested otherwise. Jaspers nipped his ear, and John chose to interpret this as affectionate. He wanted to ask what Jaspers was doing here, anyway, and where he’d come from, and where Rose’s mom was now, and who was J? And while they were on the topic of unanswerable questions, who made Calliope’s arm? Would Karkat ever love him back? What was going to happen to Jade?

A sadness that he couldn’t escape built again, and Jaspers pushed off from his shoulder with two strong, tiny feet, and flapped away into the dark.

* * *

There was one person who knew the answers to all questions. She was a genius by any definition of the word, and she had this ability to see through layers and layers of complexities, to form crosslinks between things unprecedented. Jade Harley could probably run the whole city if she wanted to, she was always at least two steps ahead of everyone else at all times, and John wouldn’t have been surprised if she’d put herself in jail just to tick off another step of her grand plan.

“Jade,” he said, from where he was perched on her little prison bunk, “I have a million questions.”

Rubbing her eyes wearily – it was about ten at night, it was better to call late because there were fewer guards around – Jade chuckled.

“Oh, John, you always do,” she said, smiling across at him. She sat on her writing desk, a pile of clean papers set beside her, with a green pen crowning it.

“Who else do you know that writes in green?” he said immediately, and her eyebrows shot up.

“Um, Nepeta and Kanaya,” she said, and then narrowed her glinting eyes at him.

“Is there anyone else?”

Jade hesitated, bit her lip, and then said, “Yes.” She wasn’t in the business of lying to him, but she’d always reserve the important stuff, which drove him to despair.

“Their name starts with J. Do you know who I’m talking about?”

“I do. I also know why he owes Vriska, I know where he is now, and I know how important he’s going to be in the future,” Jade said, pushing her glasses up her nose. “I know everything! But I can’t tell you any of it.”

John shrugged. That was predictable.

“You found Jaspers, then?” she said.

“Yeah. I could hardly believe my eyes.”

“I really wish I could tell you more, John,” she said, hopping down from her desk to come and sit beside him. “If it’s any consolation, it will all become clear in time!”

He rolled his eyes. “What happened to Rose’s mom?”

“You don’t quit, do you?” Jade giggled, and gave his arm a gentle punch. “She had to leave, because of reasons. Next.”

“Who made the mayor’s arm?”

“Just some guy.”

“But he’s in the Bastille?”

“He is indeed.”

“Do you know him?”

“That’s neither here nor there.”

“Oh, come _on_.”

She winked at him, and then chuckled behind a hand, which was as good as a yes, from his experience.

“Anything else I can help you with this evening, Mr Egbert?”

“Actually, something’s been bugging me. Remember how Karkat and Vriska busted Gamzee out of this place?” he said, eyeing her. She looked discomforted for a second, chewing her lower lip, but then she nodded. “Nobody’s said anything about getting you out.”

There was a pause, and then, with the trepidation of someone who’s choosing their words extremely carefully, she said, “That is because… I’m here for a reason.”

“To do with the guy who made the arm?”

“For someone who can be so dumb, you are annoyingly freaking smart, John!” Jade snapped playfully, and they both laughed. “There are plans, okay, and there’s one single reason why you can’t know about them yet. And it’s a pretty crappy reason, too, but that’s just how it is.”

“I guess I can learn to live with it for now,” he sighed. “But hey, how are you? I guess you’re not bored, what with all of your secrets and lies.”

“Nope! Actually I’m having a great time. I would like to see Tavros, but… oh, maybe someday.”

“I sure hope so.”

Their eyes met; hers soft and wild like moss underfoot, or the tangle of the willow tree. “Something’s happened to you, John,” she said, and she put her arm around his hard and tense shoulders, let her free hand tangle with one of his in his lap, and pulled him so that he craned his neck down to her shoulder. She had this vague scent of soot and sherbet powder, things that shouldn’t have comforted him but they so strongly did that he relaxed into her effortlessly, like slipping into a warm bath. “And I’m not talking about you being shot. I know about all that. Why do you look so sad?”

His fingers twitched under hers and she ran her fingertips over his calluses, pressed her cheek against his head and he could feel his hair moving with her gentle breaths. He didn’t want to unload everything onto her when she had so much to deal with already, when she was the one who had a _right_ to be hurting – his life was perfect by all appearances. He didn’t have a damn thing to be upset about. He gritted his teeth, but the comforting press of her fingers in his bicep reminded him that she would want to know.

“Karkat kissed Aradia,” he spat out, and his jaw twitched. Jade tensed beside him – even she hadn’t foretold this, it seemed, which only disheartened him more. His stare found the cobwebs in the corner again.

“Have you talked to him about this?” she eventually said, squeezing his hand.

“No. Vriska told me I shouldn’t…”

“Go back there again. I see.”

There was quiet, then, the sound of Jade thinking, turning over all the possibilities.

“Good things will come of this,” she decided, and John balked, pulling away from her for a second before her loving vice grip snatched him back.

“Are you kidding? He’s obviously not interested! Even if he was, he’s not anymore,” John flapped bitterly, huffing into her curtain of hair.

“John, trust me. I’ve known both of them way longer. Neither of them are red for each other.”

“Maybe their feelings have changed since you… had to go,” John said quietly.

“I don’t see that happening. They’re both in love with someone else, and they have been for a while.”

“What? Who?” John said immediately, picking his head up from Jade’s shoulder for a second before she pressed it back down.

“I can answer that, but only if you promise you won’t tell,” Jade said, and it reminded him of being a kid again – so much so that he stuck out his finger to pinky swear, and, giggling, she linked hers with his, and the deal was done.

“I won’t.”

“Okay, good. John, Aradia’s in love with Dave.”

John spluttered. Everybody loved Dave!

“Yeah, that was my reaction, too, but I can kind of see the appeal? Whatever. Oh, and Karkat has been in love with you for forever, but that’s not news.”

Shifting his weight uneasily, John frowned. “I don’t think that he is.”

“John, have I ever lied to you?”

He didn’t bother wracking his brains. He knew the answer. “No. I guess not.”

“He wants you. He thinks you’re great. The way he talks about you when you’re not around… his whole face lights up. It’s probably killing him that you haven’t been around as much.”

His heart swelled and pounded with nervous excitement.

“The last time I spoke to him about you, he was telling me about how you’d called him a ‘good friend’, or something? And he was so torn up over it. I don’t know what’s happened since then, but John… don’t you dare think that he doesn’t want you just as much as you want him. He does. And sooner or later you’re gonna have to fess up for real, mister!”

“I can’t go back there any time soon,” John sighed, and Jade tightened her grip around his shoulders.

“Give it time. He’ll wait. And you’ll both be so happy.”

“There’s just… so much. You know?” John sighed, and now her other arm wound around his waist and she held him tight, and he put his arms around her, too, and kissed the top of her head.

“It’s complicated and dangerous and John, people might die. So just be brave. I know you can do that. You’re gonna be a hero.”

“The only way that would ever happen is if you were there to help me,” he chuckled, into her hair, and she gave her a tiny affectionate headbutt.

“Always, dummy. Remember that blood oath we made when we were kids?”

He still had the little scar on his fingertip.

“Of course I do.”

“You know I’m right behind you, wherever we are, John.”

Darkhaven was small. They were never too far.

“You’d better get out of here,” she said, pulling away. “Your boss told you about Calliope’s arm, right?”

“Yeah, that’s right,” John said, pushing himself up off the bed and grabbing the key to Jade’s cell from the desk.

“Good. You’re doing a really great job, you know. Just, do like I said. Wait. And things will untangle themselves.”

“I know,” he said, smiling back at her, and after he locked her cell she waved him goodnight, and he started the walk back home, alone, again.


	16. Can't Predict The Weather Past The Storm

**Notes for the Chapter:**

>  **Trigger warnings:** Graphic violence, needles and stitches, self-harm

John watched for the next week as his boss’ frustrations swelled; the two of them would have these awkward and kind of strange candlelit conversations in cramped broom cupboards, and English would fill John’s brain with stories of past mayors and how the last really violent, bloody altercation between humans and trolls was hundreds of years ago, and their whole situation was a travesty. But no matter how much John needled, English would never admit that he had any sort of plan – it seemed that the trolls were safe enough, for now, under the mayor’s apprehension.

At least, that was what John had thought. That was what he’d been stupid enough to believe.

Tonight wasn’t a night out of the ordinary, as far as he could tell. His route had brought him to the very edges of the Brume, so that from his vantage point at the top of a greatlamp, legs crossed around it and knuckles pinned to iron rungs, he could see the colours blaring from the Lower City. It couldn’t have been more than half a mile away; he tried not to look at it as he flicked his lighter awake and lit the lamp wick. It fizzled and burst into a pained, weak yellow light – he swung shut the sooty glass panel with a little click, pocketed the lighter, and yet he couldn’t bring himself to shinny down, just yet.

His shift was over. It was time to go home, but what was wrong with enjoying the view for a while? From here, the Lower City was a cloud of light barely penetrating the thick, acrid swell of smoke, but he could just pick out emerald roofs glinting under lamplight. Here, the light came watery and weak, drizzling as best it could down onto the sick streets; the buildings were oppressive and uniform, grey and black twisted things – some were gutted completely, all boarded doors and shattered glass, and everything was so dirty and damaged, smeared with dirt and runoff. And by this time of night, the only sound was the occasional hiss of escaping steam or the creak of exhausted cogs: the factories were shut for the evening.

One last longing stare, over the barricade and down the hill, to the colours and lights, before he gave up on his hopeless dream and descended, boots hitting the dirty pavement with a thud. He’d just turned on his heel, ready to drag himself back home and crawl into bed and wake up cradling his pillow for the eighth night in a row, when there was a sound.

Three gunshots, muffled by the distance, and a yell that came high-pitched, terrified, strangled like it’d been ripped out, raw and bloody. From the Lower City. His hands twitched with indecision and then the screaming started up again; it was the quietest strain from here, he was lucky to have heard it at all – and then he decided, Vriska and Karkat be damned, he didn’t care: that wasn’t the scream of a drunk playing games. It was the horrified yell of someone who was about to lose their life, and they needed help, and John was as good as any.

The barricade had long since been fortified, a solid wall of piled wood beams and metal scraps, topped with razor wire and leaving no chinks in its armour, but the quickest way would be to get up and over it, and he was a man of action. He stood back, eyeing the thing from twenty yards, before starting towards it at speed; about three feet from it, he leapt up with all the elegance that a musclebound six foot man can possess, and found a foothold between beams – he pushed up, quickly, finding grips where he could, along rusting edges of iron, taking care to not rip his palms to bloody shreds. The razor wire was surprisingly easiest to navigate; he picked over it carefully and then freefell down on the other side, landing on his two feet, only slightly shaken. He could see why it would prove a good deterrent.

He stood now at the top of the hill that rushed down to meet the Lower City, a place he – nor anyone else, for that matter – hadn’t been in a while. The way was made of sludge-stained streets that had once connected the Lower City with the Brume, but now went disused. He felt a strange pang that quickly was shunted aside by a shaft of hot panic when another mystery scream rocketed out into the night, and from the way it wavered and was cut short so quickly, that could’ve been their last.

Adrenaline poured into his blood and he sprinted off, gathering dangerous speed down the hill, grit determination forcing his feet one in front of the other. Through the rasping pound of his breaths in his ears, he tried to think. He wasn’t sure if he recognised the voice, but it was difficult to tell, and even if it _was_ a stranger, he had to get to them, _now_. Buildings flicked by him as he barrelled around street corners, and the few trolls he passed gaped in his direction as they ran to safety – they must’ve heard the screaming, too, they were all so wide-eyed, and the sight of a Lamplighter hammering through their streets didn’t seem to comfort them any.

The sound pulled him to a part of the Lower City he wasn’t too familiar with, and he slowed to a trot as he trained his eyes and ears on the place; it was surprisingly beautiful here, if eerily silent – it put him in mind of the Athenaeum, but a little darker, and the lights were all navy blue. And then he heard whimpering, and panting, and he knew he’d drawn near; he took a right down an alleyway, ducking under strings of unlit lanterns that had fallen and were tangled and smashed. A terrible omen if ever he’d seen one.

A fluorescent lamp, fixed to the wall, puttered weakly as John tentatively stepped forwards, chest heaving, heart throbbing. He caught the scent before he’d even seen where it was coming from: the rusty, salty tang of blood, rising in waves to turn his stomach. His nose wrinkled. The rattling pant of the wounded didn’t give up, and from the way they gagged and struggled with their breaths, they were badly injured. He settled his fingers on a gun at his hip, but it was quiet – it seemed like they were alone.

He crept closer. The flickering halo lit up someone’s shoes.

Two more steps. He felt sick.

And then, he saw, and time stopped.

His jaw dropped open but it was a second before he could say anything.

Oh, god, no.

“Eridan? … _Eridan?_ ”

John hurtled forwards to collapse on his knees at his moirail’s side, cursing the light as it fluttered and sputtered, but what he could see already was that Eridan was belly-up and unresponsive, his horns were _gone_ , and his clothes, so elegant and stylish, were heavy and damp with his own violet blood. John just stared, for a second, hollow-eyed and shattered, before he heard that escapist refrain start up in his mind again – it will be okay.

_It will._

“Hey, Eridan, can you hear me?” John said, loud and clear, and Eridan didn’t so much as move. He cupped one of Eridan’s blood-smeared shoulders with a trembling hand and gave him a gentle shake, and his head lolled, but that was all. Where the fuck were his _horns?_

Eridan was still alive, judging by his grating breaths, but John was going to lose his diamond if he didn’t think fast. They needed help, urgent help, but no one was around. The Living Room was a couple of blocks away.

What would it look like, a uniformed Lamplighter carrying a near-dead troll through the Lower City streets?

Oh, he didn’t care. Eridan had to live. John loved him like a brother. He shook his head, to clear his thoughts, and tried to think calmly about the situation: it was safe to carry him, as far as John could tell – on inspection, none of his bones seemed badly broken, and it was better to take him to the Living Room and find help than it was to wait here with no guarantee that anyone would show up.

John was gentler with Eridan than he had been with even Jaspers. He lifted his broken moirail by the shoulders and wrapped a strong arm around them, jamming the other under Eridan’s knees, and with a heave he stood, cradling him like a baby – it wasn’t too difficult, because Eridan was a skinny little thing, but his long limbs were ungainly and clipped John’s pace to an urgent jog.

“You’re gonna be just fine,” John said to him. “Just hang in there.”

* * *

At the door to the Living Room, John waited with increasing impatience and creeping rage, and it was not until the fifth swift kick that it finally swung open, revealing someone that, in different circumstances, John would have been devastated to see. There was Aradia, in a white dress – bad luck for her, Eridan was pouring blood everywhere – and her mouth fell open.

“John – I – what happened – is he – oh, god, come in, quickly,” she blathered, and John followed her down the stairs and shuffled sideways through the door at the bottom, to find Karkat in the lanternlit bar.

Karkat. And Aradia. Had been alone together.

He shook it off, kept his cool as Karkat leapt up, wild-eyed, and with Aradia pulled up two booth tables into the middle of the room; a makeshift hospital bed for Eridan, who John laid down, gently as anything, atop the tables. Aradia disappeared into the back room.

“What happened to him?” Karkat said, rolling up his sleeves, swiftly followed by, “Jesus, John, is he even alive?”

“Yeah, he’s alive,” John spat back, swatting Karkat’s hands away from where they’d been unbuttoning Eridan’s shirt, to do it himself. Each inch of skin was painted with a tacky wet layer of his violet blood. Aradia returned, setting down a box of medical equipment, and then took a place by Eridan’s head, tugging her fingers through his hair that had gone curly with the blood, and then her fingers found the bloodied stumps where his horns had used to be.

She lifted her blood-coated fingers, mouth a furious curl. “Who did this?”

He and Karkat tugged Eridan out of his shirt. “It must have been a human,” Karkat said, “Because that – his horns – god, that’s just, that’s _wrong_. Where did you find him?”

John looked, then, at Karkat, for the first time in a while. His jaw was set but his eyes were huge and damp, and a muscle in the corner of one was jumping. “He was in an alleyway, a couple blocks from here. I heard gunshots and screaming from the city and… I just. I know I’m not supposed to be here, but.”

“It’s fine,” Karkat said, glancing up briefly from where he was padding away blood from Eridan’s torso, feeling for wounds. “He would probably be dead by now without you but – fucking hell, look at him.” Karkat had lost the edge to his voice, and it cracked, and his lip trembled.

“Karkat, keep it together!” John said, and right now it didn’t matter that he’d broken John’s heart. “At least until he’s safe.”

“Yeah. Right,” Karkat gruffed, scowling. “Aradia, pressure on his horns until they stop bleeding. John, did you count the gunshots?”

“Three.”

“Okay, I got one bullet, from his arm. Help me find the others. They should be upper body, judging by the blood…”

The three of them worked in quiet, and John felt weird, to scan his fingers over Eridan. His fingertip squelched into a dent of pooling blood that just skimmed the top of Eridan’s shoulder; a round had clipped him and torn through a vein, from the looks. John wadded up a scrunch of bandage and held it against the wound; purple soaked through, but slowly, and now that most of the blood had been wiped away from his chest and arms, he didn’t look so bad. There were raw patches, violet and black and swollen, popping horribly against his clammy grey skin, where presumably he’d been knocked with fists or – no, no, that was definitely from a crowbar or a pipe, bashed against his ribs.

“Got the last bullet,” Karkat said, holding it up with a grimace before tossing it aside into a dish. His forearms were coated in virulent purple blood. “So we’re dealing with three bullet wounds, one serious, bruising, cracked ribs, and… whatever the _fuck_ happened to his horns.”

“Why would anyone do this?” Aradia whispered, peeling back a wad of bandage from Eridan’s horn. A fresh dribble of bright purple anointed it, glistening in the light.

“I think they targeted him,” Karkat said, voice strained with rage. “They took his horns. I don’t think they just wanted him dead. They wanted his dignity, too.”

John pressed down a little harder on Eridan’s shoulder wound, staring at the blank space where his horns had once been. He looked… he looked like he’d had his fucking leg cut off, or something, it was just not right. John felt sick.

“Who would have it out for Eridan?” Aradia said, her dark eyes pointed to Eridan’s face.

“Who knows?” Karkat sighed, pressing a clean wad of bandage to the bullet wound. John watched – Eridan had been shot in exactly the same place John had, just two weeks ago. They would have matching scars.

“That one’s the serious one?” John eventually said, and Karkat nodded once he’d extruded the bullet. John frowned. “I got shot there, too.”

Karkat didn’t look at him when he replied. “Eridan’s a lot thinner than you. Luckily it didn’t pierce his abdominal cavity.”

“You let me walk home on my own with a serious bullet wound?” John gawped, and Karkat scowled as he dabbed another clump of bandage in iodine.

“You weren’t in immediate danger,” he said, determinedly avoiding John’s aggrieved stare, focusing his attentions on the wound, which he dabbed clean.

“It took me three hours to get home!”

“Egbert, _you_ were the one that walked off. I told you to wait.”

John’s fingers twitched against the bandage, still held firm against Eridan’s shoulder. They all fell quiet again. He could feel Aradia burning her eyes into him, but he didn’t care. Karkat had readied a needle and thread, and John watched with keen, critical eyes as he stitched Eridan back together; first, a wound on his left bicep, then the hole in his side, and finally – John peeled the bandage aside – the shallow nick on his shoulder.

“How are his horns?” Karkat rasped.

“They’ve stopped bleeding,” Aradia said, removing the bandage to reveal them. There was about an inch of candycorn-orange left, but even that was chipped and cracked, and exposed in the middle of each was a lump of white bone, peppered with holes that were now gummed with congealing blood.

“Do they grow back, or anything?” John said, but then he thought of Equius’ broken horn.

“No. No, they don’t,” Karkat said, glancing at Eridan’s head. “It’s one of the worst things you can do to a troll. And it hurts like hell. Fuck knows what he’ll be like when he wakes up.”

As Karkat readied a needle of morphine, John stared down at the stumps where Eridan’s horns had once been. He knew from experience with Karkat that trolls had sensitive horns, and his stomach dropped when he tried to imagine the pain of having them forcibly amputated. Whoever had done this, they needed to pay, John had to _make them pay_ , but most importantly, Eridan had to be safe.

“Is he… gonna wake up at all?” John dared to say into the heavy silence.

“He’s been lucky so far,” Karkat said, looking critically at all of the wounds. All things considered, Eridan didn’t look so terrible, now that he’d been sewn back together and most of the blood had been swabbed away. His bruises, though, looked venomous and gruesome. “He’ll probably be in and out for a few days. I’ll stay here with him.”

Aradia leaned down, brushing Eridan’s face with her tangle of curls, and pressed a kiss against his forehead. Then she re-adjusted his glasses on his face, smoothed his hair back to how he usually wore it, and stood back, smiling a little. Her white dress was smeared with violet.

“I think he will be fine. But John, you saved his life.”

Their eyes met. Hers said, thank you. He tried to smile at her, and managed a weak crinkle of the eyes.

“I hate to seem callous, but I really must go,” she said. “You’ll stay with him?”

She was speaking to Karkat, but John replied: “Yeah.”

“Good. I’m glad. Karkat, if he gets worse…”

“I’ll send Bec.”

“Thank you. I’ll come by tomorrow night.”

“See you,” John said, dully, eyes drifting down to Eridan again.

The door clicked shut behind Aradia and they were alone in the quiet, rumbled only by the rattle of Eridan’s breaths. Karkat turned his back on John and Eridan and crossed the room to take a seat at the bar, and for a few moments, John didn’t follow. And then it became jarringly obvious that if he didn’t, they would be stuck like this the whole night. So he gave in, and sat beside Karkat, and in silence they stayed, under the warm, silky lantern glow.

Karkat, John suddenly realised, was crying. His elbows were propped on the bar, heels of his palms pushed into his eyes, pale knuckles in his hair, and all John could see was a pained, fanged scowl, and these salmon-red tears cutting trails down his cheeks. He looked so small, in his slightly-over-large black sweater and rolled-up jeans; so broken and devastated: his shoulders shook and he choked and sobbed and sniffed and it was a few moments before John realised how hard Karkat was pulling his own hair, teeth gritting against the pain, and that wasn’t okay –

“Karkat, stop,” John said, grabbing Karkat’s wrist, and Karkat’s hands relaxed immediately, flopping against the bar, and still the tears fell. “You don’t – you shouldn’t – you are doing your best.”

“I’m an asshole, John,” Karkat sobbed, in reply, and John gnawed on his lip. He wasn’t wrong. And yet.

“Good people do bad things,” John attempted.

“I’m not good!” Karkat snapped, slamming a fist down on the bar – hard enough to hurt. He snatched it back, gulping at the pain, and John had no fucking idea what to do but he had to stop Karkat doing this stuff to himself.

He stood, placed one arm as delicately as he could around Karkat’s shaking shoulders, and pulled him in. Karkat rested his head, with its crown of downy dark hair – crow-feather-black, John remembered, with a grimace – against John’s chest, and John rocked him with the rise and fall of his breaths. They were both cut with the scent and splatter of Eridan’s blood, which was discomforting, but John tried.

“You are the best,” John insisted, bending his neck down and using his other hand to cup Karkat’s cheek, catching the tears as they dribbled down. “And yeah, you have been a tool. And I don’t know what to think about any of that, still. But… I still like you.”

“I didn’t mean to kiss Aradia,” Karkat ground out, into his bloodied lapels. “She couldn’t sleep. She was upset, and it just happened. Once.”

“Why should it matter to me who you kiss, Karkat? It’s not like we’re…”

Karkat hiccupped and wrapped both of his arms around John’s waist, and John started at the touch, then relaxed and let Karkat push his wet little face closer against his chest; he leaned down and tightened both arms around Karkat’s shoulders, held him firm and close and buried his nose into Karkat’s warm-smelling, smoky hair.

“Okay, I guess… well, maybe we are,” he said, heart stepping up. “I don’t know what we are, but obviously we are something.” Karkat laughed into his chest. “It’s okay that you kissed Aradia. I mean, I kissed Eridan, so. Just, let’s not do that again. That would be great.”

“Okay,” Karkat said into his chest.

John let a hand flit up to brush against the hairs at the nape of Karkat’s neck. With some amusement, John noted that his hair was getting long; he would have to take scissors to it again soon. His fingertips crested Karkat’s head and found a little bean-shaped horn, and he played with it in just the right way.

“Fuck, Egbert,” Karkat grumbled, but John could hear the smile in his voice.

“Oh, and another thing,” John said conversationally, biting back laughter at how quickly Karkat was unravelling in his arms. “Next time I limp off on a morphine high with a bullet wound in my side. Please stop me?”

“I thought I would just make things worse, which apparently is a talent of mine,” Karkat said lowly, bucking his head just a little into John’s touch. “But, yeah, I can do that.”

“It’s okay. I would probably have done the same thing.”

“You? No, you wouldn’t. You’re John. I don’t believe you even know how to hurt people,” Karkat said, and John’s heart throbbed.

“Well, I try not to,” John said, rubbing the tip of Karkat’s horn between a thumb and two fingers.

There was quiet for a few moments, and neither of them slackened their grip. They hadn’t been alone together in so long…

“You should go to sleep, Egbert. You can stay the night but –”

“I know, I know,” John sighed, a little upset that their perfect situation was flaking away. “I’ve been good. I found out some stuff. The mayor isn’t authorising any Lamplighter action in the Lower City! Which is totally great.”

“That is great. Wow. Good news. It’s about fucking time,” Karkat rasped, and John laughed.

“Although, everyone’s acting like there’s this huge secret –”

“Yeah, that’s a thing.”

“It’s so annoying! Everyone seems to know everything, except me!”

“You’ll find out. You think I don’t want to tell you? Not that it isn’t hilarious to watch you run around totally clueless,” Karkat said, weary, but prickly as ever. It was a relief.

“You really are an asshole.”

“I never meant to deceive you about that.”

“You should write it on your forehead, or something. Just in case anybody gets the wrong idea.”

“I’ll look into it,” Karkat snorted. “But really, Egbert, go to bed. Rose and Kanaya are out so you’ll have to sleep in here.”

“Sure. Wake me up if anything happens to him. Or, if you need me. Or even if you don’t, actually, I won’t –”

“John.”

“Heh. Sorry. Alright.”

With much reluctance, John unwound his arms from Karkat’s shoulders, and headed for one of the booths that’d had its table removed. From there, he watched Karkat draw up a stool at Eridan’s side, and John curled up on the booth seat, removing his jacket to throw it over himself like a blanket.

Eridan didn’t stir in the night, and John slept like a brick, knowing that Karkat was there.

* * *

Three days plodded by in the city, slower than ice thawing. He’d tried to distract himself, by combing the black market alleyways for Eridan’s horns and Aradia’s belongings, and he had found nothing, and his thoughts kept batting around like phantom birds. One conflict had faded but on its tail had come another, too quickly, and John wondered when sleeping dogs would lie.

He loved Karkat. Karkat… maybe Karkat loved him too, and that was so exciting, and once again he felt like he was standing on the verge of limitless potential.

Eridan was hurt. Badly hurt. Bec hadn’t come calling, and he’d received no note, so he could only assume that his moirail was stable… but for how long?

He’d come to visit, again, because he couldn’t bear the nailbiting tension any more. He’d barely slept longer than a couple of hours for the last two nights, and he needed to see Eridan for himself to feel alright again. The door was on the latch when he showed up at the Living Room, in Karkat’s hoodie and jeans, and when he went downstairs, he found something that made him inexplicably happy: Sollux, at Eridan’s side.

Sollux turned his head at the sound of the door opening, and John was taken aback – brass goggles around his neck, Sollux had revealed his eyes, and they were stunning. One wholly red and the other blue, and when he blinked they were like lights flashing. Wow.

“Hi,” John said, surprised at the feebleness of his own voice. He was exhausted. He swung the door shut, and Sollux grunted at him, turning his attention back to Eridan immediately. John crossed the room and stood on the other side of Eridan’s makeshift hospital bed; Eridan’s breathing seemed a little stronger, now, and someone had re-dressed him in a clean white t-shirt. “Has he been awake?”

“In and out,” Sollux croaked back, laying three long, thin fingers on Eridan’s wrist. He bit his lip, too, like he was nervous about the touch. But Eridan was out cold.

John missed a beat, and then threw caution to the wind and said, “You love him.” 

“I fucking hate him,” Sollux replied, and he snorted. “But, yeah.”

“You should tell him,” John said. “Uh, that you love him. Not that other thing.” 

Sollux rolled his eyes – John figured that he did, anyway. It was hard to tell; they were hazy and homogeneous.

“I don’t really wanna humiliate mythelf, but thankth,” Sollux sneered in response.

“He nearly died,” John snapped, and Sollux looked up at him, fixing those giant mismatched globes in his direction. They thinned, and John felt his jaw tighten. He didn’t know Sollux well enough to advise him on this stuff, but he was sleep-deprived, and he missed Karkat, and Sollux was being an ignorant asshole.

Eventually, Sollux caved. “Fine. I thee your point. I’ll work on it, or… whatever.”

“I’m just saying, either of you could get shot tomorrow.”

“Yeah, I get it!” Sollux huffed. “Maybe follow your own advithe and talk to KK? He’th been moping around all week.”

“Because of me?”

A shrug. “Unknown. In cathe you didn’t notithe, I’m not really a fucking romanthe guru. But probably.”

John sighed, and then pressed his hand over one of Eridan’s. He’d been awake, so that was something. He was lucky… so lucky.

“You’re hith moirail,” Sollux said, and John stared at him, before nodding. “And you thaved hith life.”

“I guess so,” John said, watching his hand on Eridan’s. He would be okay. John had found him in time.

“Thankth, man.”

“Woah, you don’t need to thank me,” John said quickly, looking up. “I wasn’t gonna watch him die!”

“Yeah, I know. But I mean, I thhould’ve been there,” Sollux said, and bit his lip. “But I wathn’t. So thankth.”

“He’s been in love with you for as long as I’ve known him, at least,” John said, swiftly changing tack. “Just saying.”

“Bullshit.”

“It’s true.”

Sollux’s eyes drifted down to settle on Eridan’s peaceful, pale face, and his jaw slackened, and the muscles at the corners of his eyes all softened, and he flashed a couple teeth in a tiny, regretful smile.

“It’th not like I even have anything to lothe,” Sollux said, and John nodded.

“Listen, if he’s alright, I’m gonna head back and leave you two alone,” John said, grinning. “If he wakes up, tell him I came to visit.”

“Thure thing. We told him you thaved him. He wath fucking ecthtatic.”

“I’m glad,” John said, giving Eridan’s hand a final squeeze. “I’ll see you around, Sollux.”

“Later,” Sollux said, still not tearing his eyes away from Eridan. God, they were cute. A tiny pang of longing jabbed his stomach as he left, closing the door behind him.

* * *

Another two days. He wanted to see Eridan awake so badly.

“He’s out, again?” John sighed, cursing his crappy luck and bad timing.

“He’s been much better, John,” Rose said, adjusting the hem of Eridan’s shirt. “He’s only out for an hour or so at a time, now, and he sleeps through the night with no problem.”

“I just wish I could stay longer for him.”

“There, there. You’re doing what must be done,” Rose said, smiling across at him. It hit John, then, that he didn’t deserve all of the amazing women in his life.

“Rose, you are so great, you know?” he said, springing up from his seat at Eridan’s side to throw an arm around her shoulders.

“Oh, I try,” she chuckled. “Will you help me make his dinner? I confess I’m not much of a cook, and it seems we have much to discuss, John.”

“Sure thing,” John said, then followed her into the back room, up two flights of stairs, and into her cramped little apartment.

He’d never been up here before, but he wasn’t remotely surprised by the look of it; it was a low-ceilinged, comfy, warmly-lit place, with shadowy corners and a distinctly Rose-like mess of random objects strewn around – huge books, half-finished knitting projects, a violin propped in the corner, an abundance of teapots and writing notebooks, pens scattered on every surface, and coats and scarves draped presumably wherever they’d landed after being cast off. Rose directed him to the kitchen, which was a tiny cupboard room, with a window facing onto the neon street and pans hanging from a rail in the ceiling that threatened to crack him in the skull every time he took a step.

“So,” she said, returning from the pantry with an armful of ingredients, that she set down on the wooden countertop. “Shall we talk about Eridan, or you, first?”

“Let’s talk about Eridan,” John said quickly, as he chopped an onion.

“Somehow I knew you’d go for that,” Rose chuckled, slicing a leek. “I’ve spoken to him a few times, when he’s been awake. It seems he can’t remember what happened to him. We’ve been working through some memory exercises and talking about what he was doing before it happened, but he can’t remember a thing.”

“I didn’t see anything,” John sighed, now peeling potatoes into the sink. “When I got there, it was already over.”

“Yes. Therein lies the problem. Several of us would like to see… retribution. But if the memory has been repressed then it will likely do more harm than good to try and force it out.”

“It’s your call, Rose. You know more about this stuff than any of us,” John said. “They took his horns, though. I’ve been looking into the black market but nothing’s come up, yet.”

“They could well be gone already, without a trace,” Rose said, and then she leaned up to grab a skillet with a clang of pans, and put it on the hob with a knob of butter.

“I’ll keep an eye out, anyway. Because, yeah, I’d like to see some _retribution_ too,” he said, tossing chopped potatoes into the melted fat, followed by onion and leek. Brandishing a wooden spoon, Rose stepped to the pan, and prodded the frying vegetables with a slightly bemused look on her face.

“Not as hard as it seems,” she noted, and John laughed. “Usually Kanaya cooks…”

It was a few moments’ quiet, punctuated only by the sizzle and pop of onions, before Rose spoke again. “As for you, John. You’ve seen things, and you want answers.”

“Yeah, but I went to Jade and she wouldn’t tell me anything, so…”

“Ah, good,” Rose said, pouring a couple of pints of broth over the vegetables. “All is going as planned, John, at least in one regard. It would be nice to find out how this happened to Eridan… but you’re on the case.”

He didn’t bother to needle her for information, and as they finished up Eridan’s soup, they talked about things only tangentially related; the state of the city library, or how Rose was thinking of redecorating downstairs. Soon, they had produced a large bowl of steaming hot soup – John carried it downstairs, only to nearly drop it when he found that Eridan had woken since they’d gone up.

“John?” Eridan murmured, turning his head in John’s direction, and when their eyes met, they both broke into irrepressible smiles; John dashed across the room, careful as he could with the soup, and set it down on a side table by Eridan. “Long time no see, huh?”

“No kidding,” John said, letting Eridan pull him down by the wrists and throw his exhausted arms over him. John rubbed Eridan’s upper arms, careful around the bullet wound, and sighed, content. “We brought you food.”

“Am I bein’ subjected to Rose’s cookin’, again?” Eridan chuckled, and Rose huffed. “I’m kiddin’, sweetheart, I swear.”

John pulled away, and spooned a mouthful of soup to Eridan, who slurped it delightedly.

“I can’t believe all a you, puttin’ your lives on hold for little ol’ me,” Eridan said, sipping another spoon of soup.

“That’s the trouble with loving someone,” Rose said, taking up a comb from the side table. “You want to look after them.”

“Aw, shucks,” Eridan said, flushing purple. “Thanks, both a you. I said thanks so many times I reckon I’m pissin’ everyone off.”

“You really have no need to thank any of us,” Rose said, teasing a tangle of Eridan’s hair apart.

“You don’t need to do all a this… Sollux was even here, last time,” Eridan said, dribbling his soup out of the side of his mouth.

“Really?” John chuckled, as he dabbed Eridan with a folded napkin. “Was he nice to you?”

“Well, no, he was a asshole like usual,” Eridan grumbled, spoon clanking against his teeth. “But he did say… he said that… well I remember kissin’ him so I guess somethin’ good musta gone down.”

“Finally, something to be happy about,” Rose said, with a tiny relieved smile as she ran the comb through Eridan’s hair. “That is, if you return his affections?”

“Oh, yeah. I mean, I don’t know what’s gonna happen but… we could be somethin’. He’s still into me even though I got all disfigured,” Eridan said, smirking a little as he reached tentatively up to pat the base of one of his horn stumps. He seemed to be taking it well enough.

John was smiling, but all the same he felt hollow, because things were falling into place for Eridan and Sollux, and Tavros and Jade in spite of the distance both knew that they loved each other – and he and Karkat were something else, some half-secure half-transient territory that he couldn’t figure out. Eridan blinked big, dark-ringed eyes up at him as he sipped soup from the spoon, and then licked his lips, and spoke.

“Any developments regardin’ you an’ Kar?”

John took in a breath, and held it for a second against his pursed lips, and then shook his head. Eridan frowned so violently that his glasses threatened to slip off his nose.

“Why not? I bet you ain’t got a single good reason for not goin’ after him.”

He had a thousand reasons, but all of them were kind of dumb. There was really no excuse for it, now, now that Eridan’s assault hung over all of them like a black cloud and nobody knew what could happen next. He could find Karkat dead tomorrow. 

“No. No, I don’t,” John said, sighing as he set down the spoon. Rose eyed him, now, twinkling eyes narrowed to slivers and an eyebrow arched.

“Then you should,” she said, and their eyes met, and she smiled at him, and he felt warm. There was reassurance and hope and even if everything else was up in flames, this, this _thing_ , maybe it could work out. “He’s been in love with you for months.”

“He never shuts the hell up about you,” Eridan added, and John felt his ears burn.

“John, go to him. Now’s as good a time as any. Seize the day,” Rose said, grinning – a real smile, not one of her sly little things – as she reached over to take the soup bowl.

“Uh, okay,” John said, heart rushing prematurely. “Wait, um – how do I look?”

“Handsome like always,” Eridan laughed, batting John’s stomach with a weak and shaky hand.

“Now _go_ ,” Rose insisted, giggling. “You are the Casanova.”

“Yeah! Okay, see you later,” John said, and he stood with a scraping of chair legs, and he still wasn’t entirely sure what he was doing when he left. It was at the street corner that he realised he’d made a terrible mistake.

There was no turning back now.

_You are the Casanova. It is you._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry to leave the story like this, but I’m on a field trip until the 28th! Hope you enjoyed this chapter, and stay tuned…


	17. It's Always You, In My Big Dreams

**Notes for the Chapter:**

>  **Trigger warning:** Body image problems

John barely noticed the buildings blurring by as he plodded through the Lower City streets; all he could pick out either side of him was a towering gloom of boarded-up windows, shattered lanterns and broken bottles, and there was a mug in the air, a stifling heat that pressed and tugged and fit the occasion perfectly. His boots crunched over debris and scattered lamp glass. The flushed warmth clung at his neck and a nervous film started beading on his forehead – and he was still about a mile away.

Every single synapse in his brain screamed with the urge to turn around and run, run back home with his tail between his legs, and pretend like the whole Johnkat debacle wasn’t a thing. And yet. Everyone seemed so _sure_ that Karkat wanted him, too, that they were good for each other, that they belonged. Like lampwick and lighter flame. And he’d promised Jade… he didn’t even have options any more.

It was okay. This was a great idea. This was the best idea ever. He kept running through the scene in his mind: he would show up on Karkat’s doorstep, confess his affections, Karkat would swoon into his arms and then they’d make out.

Yes. Perfect.

He shouldered through the door to Karkat’s building, shot up the stairs with legs that were apparently made of vapour, and turned the corner. When he got to Karkat’s doorstep, he sweated bullets and shook so hard he was practically vibrating. He could feel his stomach lurching ever downwards as his heart settled in a familiar place at the back of his throat, throbbing. Staring at the worn wood, he chewed his lip, and thought on it. He could still turn around, save face… and be lonely for the rest of his life. He weighed up his chances, decided they were shitty, and then knocked anyway.

Karkat didn’t answer instantly – obviously he wasn’t home! John would just have to go home and come another day. Too bad.

He almost turned around.

And then the door opened an inch, and there was this familiar little ritual of Karkat fixing one narrowed, catty eye at him through the gap, before swinging the door open all the way and berating him.

“What the fuck are you doing here?” Karkat growled. This was going approximately as expected, already. “It’s the middle of the fucking day, Egbert, I was asleep!”

“Karkat, can we talk?” John said, stilling his hands and then stuffing them in his pockets. He’d been flexing his fingers. Like he always did when he was a nervous wreck.

“We’re talking right now, dunkass,” Karkat snipped back, leaning against the doorframe and staring up at him with heavy-ringed eyes. He was tousle-haired and cherry-cheeked, dressed all in black: a thin sweater and boxers. John wanted to scoop him up.

“I know!” John sputtered back, chewing his lower lip with buck teeth for a second. “I mean, about a… thing.”

“Can it wait? I literally just got to fucking sleep and now you’re here.”

“It really can’t wait, Karkat!” John flustered, urgently, even though a part of him wanted to make his excuses and drop out while he still could. “This could be the only time I’ll ever actually be brave enough to tell you this so please can I come in!”

Karkat clearly did not understand the importance of this situation.

“Wait, what happened?” Karkat said, brows knitting with concern. He half-dropped his scowl, even, and shouldered further into the doorframe, leaning against it with his arms folded.

“No, no, nothing really happened, uh, actually I’m not totally sure how I ended up here, but, whatever. Rose and Eridan told me I should come. And actually so did Jade and Sollux. People have been telling me for weeks!”

“What the fuck is going on with you, Egbert?” Karkat said, narrowing his eyes like he was sceptical of John’s sanity.

“I’ll tell you if you let me in!” John pleaded, catching himself pouting – but that was apparently the key to Karkat’s heart, because his angles softened, a little.

“Okay, fine,” he huffed. “But this had better be quick and I’m going the fuck back to bed when you’re done, asshole.”

Giving himself a mental high five, John followed Karkat into his apartment. Phase one of his plan was a success. He crossed the familiar room and sank into a corner of the sofa, and turned his head to stare at grumpy, sleepy Karkat, silhouetted in the doorframe. He looked gentler in the glow of the jade lantern across the way, his edges all softened by the mahogany dimness that lived here. John loved him in every colour.

“…So, what?” Karkat spat, flinging shut the door with a bang. “What could possibly be important enough to justify waking me the fuck up when I am _extremely sleep deprived_ and ready to bash your hollow fucking thinkpan in –”

“Karkat, sit down,” John said, waving his hand at the sofa. Karkat’s blustering was like wasps in the air, a furious drone, rending the silence.

“John, _tell_ me what the fuck is wrong with you. I appreciate that it’s an extensive list but for the love of god –”

“Oh my god, why are you always so angry! Sit down, butthead, and I’ll tell you!” John despaired, but he grinned, and Karkat conceded. 

“Alright. Fine,” Karkat grunted, pitching himself into the opposite corner of the sofa and glowering across at John with bloodshot eyes. John stared back at him for a second, and then his floundering brain finally caught up to what was wrong with this situation. The distance between them was lurching miles. John needed him closer.

“Hey, how come you’re so far away?” he said, and Karkat’s scowl deepened.

“Are you fucking kidding m—ugh, fine,” Karkat sighed back, obviously figuring that it’d make John piss off sooner if he shuffled a little closer. And he did, stopping with a respectable foot’s distance between them.

“That’s better,” John said. “Geez, you’re being even more of a dick than usual.”

“Like I said, sleep deprivation, and now there’s a blithering fucknugget on my sofa who’s refusing to tell me _what the fuck he wants_ so I can _go the fuck back to bed_.”

“Okay, okay, I get it!” John flapped, holding up his hands in genuine fear of getting slapped in the face. And then: oh, yeah, that confession thing. “But, um… I’m not sure how to put this, Karkat.”

“Oh, alright. I’ll just sit here and wait while you struggle to remember how to string words together. You’re lucky I’m such a _patient guy_ , Egbert!”

“Are you like this with everyone?” John goaded, chuckling. He already knew the answer.

“Of course. Don’t get me wrong, though. You’ll always be my favourite gibbering shitgoose.”

It was really stupid but that made his chest swell with warmth.

“Karkat, your insults are the best.”

“What the fuck do you want!” Karkat roared, and John could practically hear an excess of exclamation points.

“I just wanted to tell you that…”

Oh, god. This was it. The final countdown. Come on, he urged himself. Spit it out already!

“That…”

Karkat looked like he was about to blow up. His eyes were bugging and a vein was popping in his temple; he grit his teeth and breathed sharp through his nose, lip curling by the second, and the colour rose in his ashy cheeks. And at the same time he was the most beautiful and wonderful thing John had ever seen. Everything that Karkat was, John wanted to hold it forever; not just tiny and thorny and downy, but loyal and fierce and needling and secretly aggressively loving, affectionate, and so horribly uncomfortable with himself that John wanted to pap his face every day for the rest of his life and tell him _shoosh you are beautiful and important and loved._

Well, that thought was probably his cue. He swallowed, and gazed at Karkat through his glasses, and Karkat glowered back, flashing his fangs.

“That I. Kind of. I. I guess that I.” He tried his hardest. “Karkat. Karkat, I… I really, _really_ , um… I like you.”

He felt himself burning up with how anticlimactic that was. Karkat just stared at him.

“Well that is all! Sorry for waking you! Sleep tight, okay bye!” John blathered, and then half-moved to stand, but after a second’s stupefied silence, Karkat grabbed his wrist with a hot hand, and John’s heart backflipped.

“Wait,” Karkat croaked, in a softer voice. “Did you just – are you – is – ugh, for fuck’s sake.” He growled, frustrated with himself. “Is this a joke, Egbert? Don’t go.”

“Not a joke. I’m sorry,” John said, sinking back into the cushions immediately. And then a million things came out at once. “It’s just, Eridan nearly died, and I got shot, too, and who knows what could happen, and I was scared, and Eridan and Sollux kissed! And, well, Jade made me promise I would tell you before it was too late! So I had no other option. And now everything is totally screwed up and I am an asshole and I will let myself out.”

“I just said, don’t go, you fucking moron,” Karkat said. “So don’t fucking move. I just. Just give me a second.”

John could practically hear the elevator music doodle-ooing in his head as he watched Karkat chew on his lip and knit his brows together.

_Please hold._

“Is this one of your stupid-ass pranks, or whatever? Who put you up to this?” he eventually said.

“No one!” John replied, instantly. Karkat levelled his stare, pointing his eyes up to meet John’s, and nothing about him softened even an inch.

“Because that would be cruel and unusual punishment.”

“I know! That’s why I’m not –”

“And I question my ability to handle having my heart shat on again.”

“Karkat, I get it, I would never –”

“Just in case you were under the common misconception that I don’t have feelings.”

“I’m not _totally_ stupid, I –”

“John, I…” Karkat said, and then pressed a disgruntled palm to his temple, eyes screwing shut for a second. When he looked back at John, those shockingly red irises seemed brighter than usual. The silence swelled, and then Karkat spat into it: “I like you too.”

“Well, holy shit.”

A moment’s quiet. John tried to think, and found brain: unresponsive.

“I had it bad for you the second we met,” Karkat said, and John could _not_ believe what he was hearing. “Even before that, Dave and Rose and Jade would talk about you from time to time. I wanted to meet you. At first I wanted to give you a piece of my mind, because I thought you were a shit-eating loser, but then you showed up and, well, you were pretty much the definition of tall, dark and handsome, for one thing, and it didn’t take that long before I realised that your awkward dorkiness wasn’t as grating as it was horrifically appealing, and I tried as hard as I could to not let you get to me, but then bad things started happening, and I wanted you, and I broke my back trying to keep things between us pale, but I couldn’t. Shit, that was a long sentence. My point is that I can’t pretend any more. Uh, are you okay? I don’t think you’ve even blinked yet.”

So much. There was so much. And… it was for real?

“You… me… but you… Karkat… Karkat? John?”

“Oh, hell, did I break you?”

“This is happening,” John declared.

“Yeah, it is. You big doofus.”

Somewhere else in the city, Nepeta Leijon hunkered down by her shipping wall, and scrawled _JOHNKAT IS CANON_.

“You have a crush on me,” he said, poking Karkat in the chest.

“Yes. God help me.”

“And I… I also have a crush on you.”

“I am so glad.”

The hand that he was using to jab Karkat in the chest curled around Karkat’s ribs and came to rest on his mid-back. He was warm and small and all hard muscle under his sweater, and John couldn’t believe this, at all. Everything was great. It was like the storm clouds had cleared, just for a while. They were real. Finally. After all the things that had happened.

“You call it matesprits, right?” John remembered, and Karkat looked genuinely so pleased, grinning his little snaggle-toothed grin, eyes creasing at the corners.

“You remembered. Bravo.”

“It’s… what we are?”

“Yeah. If that’s what you want,” Karkat said, and _even now_ he seemed unsure, unwilling to think that someone would want him, even though they’d just done the whole confession thing –

“I want that,” John breathed, staring Karkat right in his big damp eyes. Reds and yellows coruscated and burned back at him. “So bad. Really a lot.”

Karkat took a deep breath, and let it out in a slow line, his eyes widening. John could feel his hand getting warm on Karkat’s back, so he shifted his fingers, and Karkat gave a happy little huff.

“Oh, and sorry that I got you out of bed,” John said, half-joking, as he curled his fingers into Karkat’s shirt. “I totally understand if you want me to go.”

“You better stay –” and he was so about to say something like _shitgoose_ again, but then he borrowed John’s word instead, “–dummy.”

That was cute, coming from him, Karkat I’m-About-To-Give-Myself-A-Hatred-Hernia Vantas.

“Well, I guess that can be arranged, too. But if you want to go back to sleep, it’s okay,” he said, lifting his other hand to thread his fingers into Karkat’s hair, just the way they both liked. Karkat’s eyelids drooped for a second, and then fluttered, and his cheeks burned up in patches. His jaw slackened a little, and the points of little teeth flashed at John, and Karkat flicked his exhausted eyes back up at him.

“I don’t _want_ to, but… I haven’t slept in three days, and I’m supposed to look after Eridan tonight,” Karkat sighed.

“We can sleep. We should! And we can both go and see him later.”

Karkat looked unsure, and John could figure why. To sleep, now, when these hours were precious...

“Let’s at least go to bed, okay?” John said, accidentally thumbing a horn – whoops. That was probably coercion.

“Yeah, okay,” Karkat said, rubbing one bleary eye with the back of his hand. There was a lull, then, as Karkat dropped his hand, and they both just kind of stared at each other. Matesprits. Boyfriends. Whatever. He was John, and this was his Karkat.

He leaned down, and Karkat tilted his chin, up, and it was better than dreams. Their lips brushed, John took in a sharp breath, and Karkat grinned wickedly, exhaustedly. And they fell into each other, lips meeting, finally, and parting, to form a tiny and beautiful pocket of shared heat; eyes slipped shut and fingers moved: Karkat’s wiry arms looped John’s waist and John padded Karkat’s horn with a fingertip, coaxing out a little sound, muffled by John’s lower lip between his. Their tongues grazed each other, and they kissed like old lovers would. Effortless.

Except their teeth clacked together, but whatever, and when John pulled away he found a happy, unfolded, beaming Karkat.

“Wow,” John said. “Just. Wow. Look at you. Do you even know that you are the cutest thing ever? It is a fact.”

“You’re gonna make me throw up.”

“But. You’re so small. I have like, half a foot on you, or something. And when you get angry – heh, I guess that is always – nobody even thinks twice about taking you seriously, even though you are just the tiniest.”

“If I didn’t have short man syndrome before –”

“You shouldn’t. I like it. I like that I can just pick you up.”

“Don’t you dare.”

He did anyway, obviously, scooping Karkat into his arms and pushing up off the sofa, and Karkat only wriggled for half a second before he let up, and sighed, butting his horns against John’s chin. His little compact weight was nothing for John’s iron-hard arms. It was like carrying a cat.

“Secretly I think you love this,” John said, carrying Karkat to his bedroom door. Karkat leaned down and turned the handle.

“Secretly, I think _you’re an ass._ ”

John jostled Karkat in his arms and Karkat squawked, clinging onto his shoulders, and his lip curled, but John mashed their mouths together – messily, this time, unpracticed and awkward. Something a bit like their love, actually. But it was so easy.

“John,” Karkat whimpered, as his fingers tangled in John’s hair.

“What’s up?”

“Please put me the fuck to bed.”

“Right! Sorry,” John said, ducking through the doorframe and then crossing the room to set Karkat gently down on his mattress, which gave a weary little squeak. Karkat fell back in an instant, struggling with the blankets until they were tucked up to his chin, and he curled up, knees-to-chest.

“And now get in here and snuggle me.”

“One second,” John said, flushing with delight and embarrassment and wonder.

He struggled mentally with how much clothing to leave on, and ended up stripping down to his t-shirt and boxers, and very nearly collapsed when he noticed that Karkat was determinedly _not_ looking in his direction because he was like some chivalrous little knight, or something, and when John crawled into bed next to him the mattress groaned under the weight of all his muscly limbs and he lay face-to-face with Karkat. And he put a hand on Karkat’s knee.

“You make this cuddling thing very difficult.”

Without speaking, Karkat pressed his palm to John’s shoulder and pushed until John got the hint and rolled over, and he lay staring at the ceiling in confusion for a second before Karkat turned, and lay himself down in a little crescent, right there, all his weight on John’s torso. Exactly like a cat, warm and soft; all he was missing was the purring. John pressed his hands either side of Karkat’s waist, and it would’ve been really appropriate if he could’ve circled him completely.

“You… I really like you. You know,” John started in a whisper, and then the rest poured out easy, and quiet, lilting with the flow of his breath. “I like you like this. I like you angry and yelling. I like you when you call me fuckass, I like you when you make me pet your horns and pretend you only love it half as much as you do. Karkat, I just really like you! I will tell you fifty times. I will tell you all the time. I don’t think anyone has ever told you that they like you as much as you deserve to hear it.”

Karkat twitched, grinned against his collarbones, and reached up to pat John’s ear with weary fingertips.

“I know your heart is all broken and stamped on but I can probably fix it. I know how much you hate yourself… I can fix that, too.”

“And as for you,” Karkat mumbled, and John deferred to him instantly. “You detach yourself from reality and pretend that we’ll all be fine. Because you’re scared, and you don’t think that John Egbert can handle the shitstorm that’s coming.”

John shifted uncomfortably underneath Karkat.

“I want you to know that John Egbert is… amazing. He can fix anything. He’s strong and you’d think it’d make him dangerous, but no, because his heart’s too big to let him use his strength for hurting. He will hold your broken heart in his hands like it’s made of glass. And you’ll trust him, accidentally at first, and then with everything. Because he can cope.”

John chuckled, shifting Karkat’s weight with his hands. “You’re… feeling nice, today, huh?”

“You caught me at a bad time. I turn into a sappy asshole when I’m sleepy,” Karkat mumbled, stretching his arms out either side of John’s head before curling his hands into John’s hair and winding into a tighter little ball. In a fleeting moment of unadulterated courage, John pushed up the hem of Karkat’s shirt and settled his hands on Karkat’s bare skin. So warm and smooth. Karkat pecked him on the neck, and their tiny little world was here, and complete.

* * *

John didn’t sleep; he’d never felt less tired in his life, and by now it was established that he was the guardsman and Karkat his sleeping charge. The rise and fall of his chest as he breathed had soothed Karkat to rest, and there under his palms, a tiny twitching ball of snoozing anxiety and tottering, quiet rage, was the tiniest troll, the sweetest little thing. His hot breath washed over John’s neck, and every time John shifted his hands he would trill this miniscule note of dreamy happiness, a noise John had never thought Karkat could make.

He’d been watching the minutes pass on Karkat’s bedside clock for a while. It was getting late; they’d have to leave, soon, for Eridan.

“Hey, ducky,” John said, pressing his fingers gently into Karkat’s side. Karkat did not respond. (Well, he snored a little louder). “Sugarplum. Sleeping beauty. Wake up.”

A snarfle.

“Baby doll. Schnookums. Honeybee. Wake up already,” John said softly, grinning to himself as he dug his fingers against Karkat’s ribs, under his arms, trying to jolt him awake. “Cutie pie?”

Karkat stirred, but didn’t speak.

“C’mon, Karcuddles.”

“The fuck did you just call me?”

“Good morning, princess,” John said, pecking the top of Karkat’s head, between his horns. Karkat looked confused, affronted, but mostly just really happy, glowing and warm and stretching out his back, grinning with his eyes shut.

“God, you’re fucking annoying,” Karkat said, and then, balancing his weight awkwardly on one elbow, leaned over and pressed his lips at random to John’s face, pushing his glasses askew and making him flood crimson.

Laughing, John said, “I know,” and then cupped Karkat’s cheek with a hand, and kissed him on his hot little mouth; the softness of his darting tongue and the firm pressure of one tiny fang on his lip sent a thrill down John’s spine, making new warmth. Oh, he could love this man. So easily.

“Come on,” he said, with his lower lip still between Karkat’s teeth. Karkat released him, shuffling away so that he was kneeling, straddling John’s belly. He glanced over, checked the time, and sighed, before pushing off the bed and retrieving jeans from where they had been unceremoniously thrown on the floor. He was an untidy little thing. He was incredible, silhouetted in the light pouring through the window, even with his bedhair and rumpled clothes.

“Hey,” John suddenly said, “Has Eridan seen what he looks like, yet?”

Karkat shook his head as he dressed himself. “I was planning to show him tonight. You’re his moirail, what do you think?”

“Uh,” John said, and then shook off his self-doubt. “I think it’s about time, but I don’t think he’ll be happy about it.”

“I’d say you’re right,” Karkat sighed, perching on the edge of the bed as he pulled on socks. On a whim, John snatched up a comb from the bedside table and shuffled over to sit cross-legged behind him. Karkat tensed for a half-second, and John said, “Can I?”

Karkat’s shoulders sank.

“Sure.”

* * *

When they got to the Living Room, the lamps were all out – the light streaming through the door at the bottom of the stairs let them pick out that Eridan and Terezi were sitting side-by-side on the tables, arms slung around each other’s shoulders. Terezi had her head resting on Eridan’s shoulder and was fast asleep, goggles slung around Eridan’s neck. Eridan was snoozing too, it seemed; John could hear the burbling snore of the air rushing through Eridan’s bruised nose, rumbling the quiet.

“Light the lamps,” Karkat whispered, and John nodded, trailing the edges of the room and rekindling the lights with the flame of his lighter. Out of the corner of his eye he watched as Karkat, with gentle palms, roused Terezi from her sleep.

Warmth and light flooded the room, and John tuned into the hushed conversation going on in the middle of the room as he coaxed candles into life.

“How has he been?” Karkat whispered.

Terezi rubbed her eyes. “Better. He had a nightmare.”

“Shit,” Karkat hissed.

“And he still can’t remember what happened to him,” she sighed, and John watched as she laid Eridan down with the tenderness of a mother putting her child to bed. He felt his heart twinge.

“Rose is doing her best, though. He’ll be okay,” Karkat said, laying a hand on Terezi’s shoulder. He then unclipped her goggles from Eridan’s neck, with the tiniest smile as he did so, and pressed them into Terezi’s hands. “You’re going to see Aradia, right?”

“Yeah.”

“If you see Vriska, can you ask if she –”

“She has,” Terezi said, and John looked away quickly, as Karkat’s eyes thinned in his direction. Karkat gave a little sigh (of relief?), and then Terezi threw her arms around his shoulders. Awkwardly, John busied himself with a wall lamp.

“Hey, it’s okay,” Karkat whispered, patting Terezi’s back with one hand. “We’ll figure this out.”

Eridan gave a low grumble, and twitched in his sleep.

“I hope so. Dave’s been… acting weird,” Terezi said, sighing as she pulled away from Karkat and fastened her goggles.

“Weirder than normal?” Karkat said, lip curling.

“I think it’s the stress. He’s not sleeping right.”

John felt another, substantially more painful, twinge in the chamber of his heart.

“Borrow Bec for a few nights. I think Tavros is looking after him right now. He’s… comforting.”

“Yeah, I’ll try that,” Terezi said, and then sighed, deeply. “Well, I’ll be back in a few days. Later, Karkles.”

“Bye, Terezi,” Karkat said, and he set his hands on Terezi’s shoulders, where they lingered for a second before she removed them, gave them a squeeze, and then left.

The door clicked shut, and there was quiet, again. Karkat looked unsettled, flustered; even though John had just brushed his hair half an hour ago, it was a mess of agitated flicks that was only worsening as he worriedly ran his hands through it, chewing on his lip all the while. John pocketed his lighter, having filled the room with ruddy amber light, and strode across the room to hover at Karkat’s side.

“Come on,” John said, softly as he dared, pushing one hand against Karkat’s waist. Karkat curved into his touch immediately. “It’s gonna be okay.”

Slowly, he wrapped his arm around Karkat, tugging him into a firm hold. His other arm looped Karkat’s shoulders, and John pinned him close against his sturdy chest. Karkat was pliable but not yet defeated in his arms, he butted his horns gently up against John’s chin, and sighed.

“Not interruptin’, am I, boys?” Eridan suddenly said, and over the top of Karkat’s head John caught Eridan’s eyes, and they grinned at each other. Karkat jumped away a second after that, flushing, but smirking all the same.

“Yes, actually,” Karkat snipped, turning on his heel to fix Eridan with a needling stare. “I preferred you when you were unconscious.”

“Missed you, Kar.”

“I missed you too. Asshole,” Karkat said, levering Eridan under his shoulders with one arm to help him up.

There he sat, Eridan Ampora, a living legend, infamous in this city’s dank underbelly for his raw and unadulterated sex appeal – but as far as John could see, tonight he looked like a kid, sitting legs crossed on the table, in a t-shirt that was way too big for him (it could’ve belonged to Equius for how much it swamped him) and worn jeans, fluffy socks, with bags under his eyes to rival Karkat’s, despite how much he’d been sleeping, and a mess of paling purple bruises colouring his face. His hair was a mess, flopping all over the place, mostly covering the nubs where his horns had been. He was still six feet of slender and elegant limb, still beautiful, but he looked smaller now. Someone had taken his glasses and folded them at his bedside.

“Hey, Eridan,” John said gently, laying a hand on his shoulder. He caught Karkat’s eye for a second. “Have you looked in a mirror yet?”

“No,” Eridan said back, looking up at him with these huge, trusting eyes, glinting amber and amethyst in the dim light. John had never seen him look so vulnerable. “Can… can I?”

“If you want to, you can,” John said, and then without half a second’s deliberation he took his hand from Eridan’s shoulder and threaded his fingers into Eridan’s floppy pushed-back hair, knuckles brushing up against the healed stumps of his horns. Eridan gave a tiny rumble from a point low in his throat, and his eyelids half-slipped shut.

“Yeah. Yeah, I wanna see,” Eridan murmured sleepily, and John met Karkat’s eyes, again, and Karkat disappeared into the back room.

“Alright. Me and Karkat are here, okay?” John said, then looped both of his arms around Eridan’s neck and pulled him into his chest. Eridan huffed into John’s collarbones, ducking his head under John’s chin – he could do that now, without the threat of spearing John in the throat.

In a minute, Karkat had returned with one of Kanaya’s mirrors from upstairs. John released Eridan to take a seat beside him, and Karkat, holding the reflective surface to his chest, stood in front of the pair of them. Eridan looked hollow-eyed and tired, and afraid, mostly, white knuckles pinned to the edge of the table, breaths a little wet and raspy.

“Eridan, you know we all still feel the same about you,” Karkat said. “Sollux still wants you. John will still look after you.”

“No matter what you look like,” John said, pressing one of his huge hands over Eridan’s freezing fingers.

“Yeah, I know,” Eridan said limply, and then shrugged. “C’mon, then, Karkles. Let’s see the damage.”

Karkat turned the mirror around. For a second, Eridan didn’t respond, just looked across at himself, sunken-eyed.

And then his lip curled.

However John had been expecting Eridan to respond, it hadn’t been quite like this. Eridan took one deep, rattling, wheezy breath and then seemed to collapse inwardly, like his heart had just exploded and his ribs caved in, and he slumped sideways into John, and it was another second before John realised he was _sobbing_ , and these violet-tinged tears were coursing down his papery cheeks, and John threw his arms around Eridan quicker than he’d ever moved in his life and held him in a vice grip.

“Take it away,” Eridan managed, anguished, “I don’t wanna – I don’t wanna –”

Lips pressed together, Karkat lay the mirror face-down on the table, and then intercalated himself into their hug, one hand on Eridan’s back, the other around John’s shoulders. In the warm space between John and Karkat’s chests, Eridan shook and bawled, hiccupped, choked, and rasped.

“Why?” he whispered. “Why – the – fuck –”

“Eridan, I’m sorry,” was all John could think to say, pressing his cheek to the top of Eridan’s head.

“Who the _fuck’s_ gonna want me now?!” he wailed, butting his head hard into John’s collarbones.

“Eridan, _Sollux_ wants you, you know that! You can still get what you want,” Karkat said, firmly, “And for god’s sake, having small horns doesn’t make you disfigured.”

Eridan paused, mid-sob, to laugh at that.

“Shit, sorry, Kar,” he burbled out, snatching up one clammy wrist to pad at his tears.

“So you look like shit,” Karkat said. “You nearly fucking _died_ Eridan, nobody’s expecting you to look like a fucking supermodel still. You’ll pull yourself back together when you’re better.”

“And we all love you no matter what!” John said, and then recalled this vague memory of a time when he wasn’t sure how to be someone’s moirail. This… this was probably it. He leaned down, to whisper in Eridan’s hot little ear. “You’re still my diamond.”

“Thanks, guys. I didn’t think you would all wanna help so much.”

“You thought we would leave you to die? Eridan, come on. You’re too important,” Karkat said.

“But, all a you… it’s just touchin’ as hell, that’s all,” Eridan murmured, voice cracking. “Say, I don’t s’pose – nah. Nah, he wouldn’t a come, he wouldn’t…”

“Who?” John said.

“Nobody, I’m bein’ a big idiot,” Eridan sighed. “I was just thinkin’ on how much I wanted a smoke, and then I remembered –”

“Eridan,” Karkat said quickly, very much with the air of someone who just caught on. “Eridan, there’s no way he could’ve known.”

John’s brow furrowed – who were they talking about?

“I know, I know,” Eridan sighed, pushing his cheek a little harder against John’s chest. “I just miss the fuck outta him.”

Karkat ran his fingers into Eridan’s hair, padding gently at his scalp, brushing only fleetingly at the base of one missing horn.

“I know,” was all he said. And then, Eridan tugged away from John just a couple of inches, to peer up at Karkat. He opened his mouth, but Karkat shot him down too quickly. “Eridan, don’t.”

“Yeah. Sorry. Now ain’t really the time,” Eridan said exhaustedly, and then unravelled himself from their arms, rubbing a sticky purple film from his cheeks. “Say, when can I go home?”

“Soon,” John said, comfortable with this change of subject. “You seem better today.”

“Terezi said you had a nightmare,” Karkat followed up, and Eridan shrugged irritably, frowning.

“Yeah, and before you ask, I don’t remember what happened, or anythin’, just that it was fuckin’ shitty,” Eridan said, and Karkat sighed, padding Eridan’s shoulder with a palm that’d been used too much for comforting, lately.

“Forget about it for now,” John said. Then he dug around in his pocket for something. “You’ll be okay. Hey, wanna play Go Fish?”

Karkat stared at him and the pack of cards in his hand. Eridan balked, blinked twice, and then, with the unadulterated enthusiasm of a five-year-old, nodded, fiercely.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Happy 4/13!!! :)


	18. What Gets You off?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

>  **Trigger warnings:** Violence, guns, post-traumatic stress reaction (dissociation), disordered eating, depression
> 
>  **Note** There is sexual content in this chapter.

A steel teaspoon chimed against a porcelain mug whose rim was chipped and lip, coffee-stained. It made a bright soothing music that sparked through the slowly reviving air of Eridan’s kitchen: here were two smells, the scent of fresh tea, and neglect. This was a house, no home, this was a building to be survived in, not one for living – at least, that was John’s estimation of the place. It was clean, lantern-lit and opulent, but sterile, over-glossy, sparse in its decoration. The marble tiles here had no signs of wear and the ridges of the panelled walls were scraped clean of dust; it reminded him of a show home. Even now John was using a mug that he’d brought from the Living Room, because Eridan’s cupboards were near-empty. He watched the liquid swirl as ochre seeped from a silk teabag – this, Kanaya’s donation to the cause. Today, John was on a home visit. It’d been two weeks since he’d last stopped by, and counting the days was beginning to get painful.

“Um,” said a sudden and small voice, and John, lifted from his contemplative stupor, suddenly jerked his head up. “Sorry,” the apology followed like clockwork, predictable to the second.

“What’s up?” John said, eyes crinkling as he looked over at Tavros, who was staring around Eridan’s kitchen with an exasperated fondness that John knew. And then, amber eyes settled on ocean blue.

“It’s just that – well, I didn’t want to bring it up, but, um, it’s just, your face,” Tavros managed, “You look, uh, really bad.”

A beat.

“Oh! I didn’t mean, to say that you’re ugly, you’re not, I just—” 

By this point, John was already laughing. So hard that he had to set the teaspoon down. So hard that his cheek was kind of hurting. But just the one.

* * *

Two men stood, chandelier-lit, in the entrance hall of a stately Athenaeum home. One, clad in navy blue and armed to the teeth; the other, a shrinking gentleman in a burgundy smoking jacket, fingers heavy with rings that flashed purple and gold in the ambient glow.

“Fine, boy! You’ve cornered me!” spat the older of the two, throwing his hands up, fingers sparkling. “I confess, I have been intimate with a handful of trolls in my time – we all have our transgressions!”

“I don’t, sir.” John skirted the truth, deadpan. “Most decent folks don’t.”

Those rings were oddly familiar, somehow. It was the purple that blared at him most loudly, like there was a puzzle piece he had yet to fit.

“But it’s all water under the bridge now, as I’m sure you’ll agree,” the man went on. He was a baron, skulking at the bottom of the upper echelons, and not lordly enough to escape the Lamplighters’ scrutiny. “Given that I had the pair of them taken care of –”

He was cut off quite suddenly by John crossing the distance between the two of them, his grime-wet boots marking the embroidered rug.

“Taken – _care_ – of?” John said, levelling his stare through his glasses, dangerously. Murderously. It all fell into place like the point of a knife coming down on his back: here was the bastard responsible for the wrecking of Eridan Ampora, wearing his rings as tokens of dominance. From the sound of it, he had a hand in someone else’s suffering, too.

“Well, I, I, tasked some men with it, you see, wipe my record clean, if you will, destroy the evidence,” the baron prattled, blanching. “Could you step away from me?”

“I’m going to have to take you back to headquarters, sir,” John said, curling his tongue around the words like they were the sweetest thing. Justice was so very beautiful. “Soliciting trolls is against the law.”

“Look here, I have proof that one of them is dead, I have his horns,” said the baron, and John’s fingers twitched as though they wanted his guns. He’d made a trophy of John’s moirail. He had to suffer. “And the other, she, she might still be alive, but she’s got nothing left. They took everything. Officer, they have both been destroyed, so surely –”

_Aradia._

“You are under arrest for soliciting troll prostitutes. You have the right to remain silent –”

John had to hand it to the baron; he wasn’t much to look at, grey-threaded hair and a little stooped, small, and weedy, so it came as something of a surprise when a crowbar smashed into the side of John’s face, breaking his glasses on impact and causing him to bite right through his lower lip. Where had he been hiding that thing?! John reeled, mostly with shock rather than pain – he’d been hurt worse than this – and spluttered blood spray onto the rug before freeing a gun from its holster and pointing it square at the baron’s chest, and he swung his head back up again, squinting for focus. His shattered glasses crunched underfoot and the baron’s shoulders shook as he stared down the barrel of John’s cocked gun.

“Drop your weapon and come with me.”

A drop of blood, quivering on John’s jawline, dripped to the floor. Oh, well. This was all in the job description – somewhere.

It wasn’t until John arrived in his boss’ office that he received any form of a thanks for his work. But first:

“You look terrible. What happened. To your face?”

John gave a low sigh and then placed his hands flat on his boss’ desk, leaning against it for support not because he felt weak but purely because he was so exhausted of this day – and it was barely later than noon. English leaned back in his chair so that it creaked, and his crows’-footed eyes wrinkled further as they pinned John with an imploring stare. Silhouetted by lamplight pouring like honey through the panelled windows behind his desk, English seemed more imposing than John was used to. He hesitated, and then straightened his shoulders and did his best not to squint. With the back of a hand he wiped at a sticky patch of blood on his cheek.

“The baron that you sent me to arrest got the jump on me,” he explained curtly, and was relieved when his boss smirked.

“These things happen. You are strong. You will heal,” English said, and then raised a hand. “But before you go. Let us discuss.”

English pushed himself out of his chair and crossed the room; John watched over a shoulder, admiring with slight envy, as he often did, English’s barrel chest and thick-strapped arms, cut close by the navy felt of the Lamplighter uniform. English swung shut his office door and locked it with a silver key hung from a loop at his belt. John swallowed drily, a little nervous.

“What is it, sir?” he said, voice clipped and measured and as conversational as possible.

“Sit down,” was all English said, before taking his seat on the other side of the desk again. John did as he was told, sinking down into a hard-backed wooden chair that squeaked under his weight. English leaned forwards, elbows on the table, fingers laced. “My little plan. To undermine the authority of my sister.”

John nodded, feeling his neck come up in a prickling heat.

“I have been. Embarrassingly unsuccessful,” English said, and then grit his teeth. John had rarely seen his boss livid, as he was pretty well emotionless – so even a mildly irritated Worgan put his teeth on edge. It was portentous. “Our options are dwindling. Think about it, Egbert.”

It was an invitation to prove that he was trustworthy. John met his boss’ eyes across the table, and there was fetid electricity in the stagnant air, threatening to spark around him and paint his skin with red lines of treason. He thought he knew the answer, but if he was wrong, to say it would cleave his life, his status, in half. If English couldn’t get around the mayor, then she was an obstacle. And obstacles had to be overcome.

“You want… to overthrow her?” John said, and then inhaled sharply through his nose as his boss’ expression shifted inscrutably like a storm cloud – but then he smiled, resigned, and nodded with his eyelids shut for a moment. John let out a puff of breath and sank in his chair.

“It is good to know which of you are really on my side,” English said, and John just nodded at him, bug-eyed.

John’s brain turned things over at dizzying rates. If English intended to overthrow the mayor, then he wanted the title for himself: that would put John in the position of confidant to the mayor himself, at the crux of the greatest threat to the Lower City. He’d be an idiot not to push this. Whatever English was planning, it had to succeed.

“The Lamplighters are all that I have, boss,” John said, and English nodded grimly.

“It is that. That makes you an asset,” English said. 

“Thank you,” John said, doing his best to sound affected. Then, he went on in hushed tones. “So… not to push you, because this must be hard, but is that what you are planning to do? Take the city from Calliope?”

“Indeed,” English said, in a voice lower than John’s. “Not yet. Soon.”

“Who else have you told about this?”

“No one. Just you,” English said, grinning at him.

“I can spread the word to the other Lamplighters. It might make them easier to convince if they hear it from me first.”

“Yes. I believe that we will prevail.”

“I think it will be possible. There are a lot of us. Most people seem frustrated with the way she’s handling the trolls, but can’t do anything about it.”

“The time to take matters into our own hands is overdue,” English said, and then stood again with a scraping of chair legs. “Thank you, John. You will report to me in a week.”

On his way out, John shook English’s hand, and once he’d finally left he clutched his palm to his stinging lip and made his way down to the basement first aid stations.

* * *

“Yeah, I kinda got into a fight!” John said, chipper as ever, plucking the teabag out of the mug with a finger and a thumb. Because he was hardcore and reckless and not afraid of things like hot chamomile.

“Oh. Um, did you win?”

“Well, I had a gun,” he said offhandedly, and then, at the stricken look on Tavros’ face, he rushed to add, “I didn’t kill anyone! I just had to arrest him. He… he kind of is the reason why Eridan nearly died and Aradia had all her stuff stolen, so.”

“In that case then I am glad you won!” Tavros said, and then wheeled himself over to John’s side. “But, um, should you be looking after people? If you’re hurt too?”

“Psh, I’ll be _fine_ ,” John said, waving a hand vaguely at Tavros, ignoring the spiderweb of pain radiating like fire across the side of his face. It was all good.

Sollux appeared in the doorway, goggles around his neck, looking harassed and flushed and with a couple of very recent lovebites on his neck. John spluttered.

“Don’t forget the honey. Orderth from your majesthty,” Sollux spat, rolling his eyes, and John blinked at him, drawing blanks. It didn’t help that everything was also a tiny bit out of focus, because his spare glasses weren’t quite right.

“Honey…?”

“In the cupboard.”

“But how do you…”

“It’th a hobby,” Sollux said, shrugging, before lurching away back to the lounge. John swung open the cupboard and sure as anything, there was a little jar whose label read, in mustard yellow ink, just _honey_. He didn’t believe it. There were no bees anymore, not underground, and he only vaguely knew what they were anyway from one of Karkat’s books, so –

“He, um, he has these mechanical bees, and alchemy, and – oh, you already –”

John had stuck two fingers into the jar and was now sucking on them, eyes wide with frank appreciation.

“Holy hell that’s good stuff.”

Four spoons of it went into the tea. He knew enough about Eridan to know that he liked things sickly sweet. Again the jewel noise of spoon on cup, then John secreted the honey jar back in the cupboard, took the mug in steady hands, and led the way across the hall into the lounge.

Eridan’s lounge was high-ceilinged and regal, more like a parlour than a cosy sitting room; china blue papered the walls and every accent was milk-white and gleaming, and the floors were walnut gloss. Candleflames snaked in polished holsters, grouped on every surface, and beautiful wrought silver wall lanterns glowed a merry, inviting marmalade. In front of an ornate and presently extinguished fireplace was clustered a long sofa, coffee table, and armchairs, all in matching plush chocolate. This room looked a little more lived-in, only because the curtains were drawn and a mess of blankets hung down from the sofa, where Eridan lay, stretched out like a resting lion. Predictably, Sollux was sat on Eridan’s chest, held in place by Eridan’s limpet grip around his waist.

“Tea for the ailing,” John said, chuckling as he set the cup down on the coffee table, and then threw himself into an armchair that Tavros stopped beside.

“You two are perfect lil’ angels. But what’s it gonna cost to see you in maid outfits?” Eridan said, shifting Sollux’s weight on his chest. Sollux very much had the appearance of someone who had long accepted their tragic fate.

“Um,” Tavros said, and John snickered.

“Oh my god, let me go, you clingy dickweed,” Sollux finally snapped, struggling against Eridan’s clamp-like hold of him. He sprang free, but sank down onto the edge of the sofa almost immediately. Leaning over, he grabbed the tea mug, and let sips dribble into Eridan’s mouth.

“S’sweet,” Eridan murmured delightedly, the colour coming up at the sides of his neck. He looked better lately; his bruises had almost vanished, just traces of dusky sick purple here and there, and his horn stubs were completely healed over, flashing yellow under his hair, which he’d bothered to style into its usual quiff. He’d obviously been well enough to shower and groom himself, although he was still too weak to stand up for too long at a time, John had heard. It seemed they’d been keeping him entertained and looked after; Aradia lived in the spare bedroom, he’d learned, and Bec was more or less a permanent fixture – currently snoozing upstairs. Sollux and Tavros had moved in, too.

To see Eridan in such good spirits was enough to convince John that everything was going to be fine. If they could fix him, they could fix anything.

“So, what have you guys been up to?” John said, leaning back into the soft cushion of his chair and crossing his legs. He could feel every ache and pain in his muscles oozing to nothing.

“Cleanin’ up this dump,” Eridan chuckled, and then took another sip of tea. “It ain’t exactly been habitable for the last few years or so.”

“Oh! Well, it looks great,” said John as he looked around the room: the spotless glamour of the lounge alone spoke for itself.

“Thank you,” Sollux said, a little bitterly, his lip curling. “God knowth I’ve been down on my hands and knees cleaning floorth with a rag like a fucking maid –”

“Hey, precious, quit your whinin’, you know I’d do it myself if I could move,” Eridan snipped.

“You _can_ move!” Sollux said, exasperated, but he was still gentle when he tipped the cup into Eridan’s pursed lips.

“I ain’t cut out for hard labour, sweetness,” Eridan shrugged, and John chuckled. This was enough to grab Eridan’s attention; heavy-ringed yellow eyes swivelled in his direction. “What happened to your face, anyway, kiddo?”

“Work stuff,” John sighed. “Listen, can we talk?” Eridan needed to know certain things.

Sollux set down the mug on the coffee table about a half second after John had asked this and pushed himself up from the sofa.

“C’mon,” he said to Tavros. “The dining room ith horrific.”

“Um, okay, sure,” Tavros said, and the pair of them left tactfully and quickly, closing the door behind them. Apparently moirail business was serious stuff.

“What’s up, Egbert?” Eridan said, instantly worried and official, suddenly the second-in-command of the Lower City that he’d introduced himself as – even as he lay prone on the couch, head propped up on pillows and draped in silk like a precious offering.

“Just some stuff that happened today,” John said, relocating to the space that Sollux had just vacated; a little space in the hollow where Eridan, on his side, curved around him. Cosy.

“You alright? What happened?”

“At work. The guy I had to arrest, he… he’d been paying for troll prostitutes,” John said, and Eridan sniffed.

“No way. I probably know the guy.”

“Yeah, about that,” John said, and felt his chest ache. There was no way to be tender about this. “He, uh. He ended up telling me that he paid for you and Aradia to be killed.”

Eridan visibly winced at this, tore his eyes away from John and pointed them at the floor, and pulled the blankets further up to tuck his chin beneath them. John laid one big hand on Eridan’s chest through layers of fabric, and rubbed softly, reassuringly.

“He had your horns. They’re with the Lamplighters, now, and I can get them back if you want them.”

Shaking his head, Eridan said, “Ain’t any use to me now. What about Aradia’s stuff?”

“No leads,” John sighed, and Eridan nodded. And then John lifted his hand to play with the hair behind Eridan’s ear. He glanced at the horn stubs. “Do those still hurt?”

“Nah. Feels kinda nice, actually,” Eridan said, and his crafty grin was back, and John pushed his fingertips up against the cracked bone. The inside was strange, still slightly porous in the process of sealing over, and gritty under his fingertips. Eridan made a content little noise, not far from a purr, and sank further into the pillows.

“Karkat likes this,” John said absent-mindedly.

“Oh yeah?” Eridan said slyly, but his smile faded fast. “Say, check up on him today. He ain’t been openin’ his door to anyone.”

John faltered. “For how long?” he said, and then cleared his throat in a vague attempt to hide the crack in his voice.

“Two weeks or so. Gamzee went over last week and ended up bashin’ the door in to see him. Didn’t go over so well with the lil’ crab. Gamzee’s been down in the dumps about it since, said he couldn’t help anyway and now Karkat’s just angry at everyone,” Eridan explained, and John sighed.

“Yeah, okay. I’ll head over later,” he said. “Maybe he needs to move in with someone.”

“What do you think we’re redecoratin’ for?” Eridan said. “We got two more spare bedrooms. Thinkin’ we can cram Kar in one, Gamzee in the other. Dave and Terezi are livin’ with Rose and Kan, Nep and Equius have each other, and Sol, ‘Radia and Tav are all livin’ here,” he rattled off. John bit back a laugh at Eridan’s haphazard way of reworking people’s names.

“Fef ain’t accounted for, nor Vris, although from what I’ve been hearin’ they’ve been gettin’ awful friendly lately,” Eridan said, and his eyes wrinkled. John was not sure what to do with this information, so he just grinned.

“What’s with everyone moving around?”

“It just don’t feel safe bein’ alone,” Eridan said. “Not anymore.”

John leaned down to kiss Eridan on the forehead. His heart was breaking for all of them, and mostly for poor Karkat, poor heart-shattered exhausted lonely Karkat Vantas, and Eridan, ripped in half by an assault whose only mercy was that it hadn’t killed him.

“I just didn’t think people were gonna want me dead,” Eridan said, as John pulled away. “Although I remember thinkin’, while it was happenin’, that – that –”

He went quiet. His eyes widened. All anyone had been telling him was that Eridan couldn’t remember a thing. It seemed that the memory had just made a rude return.

* * *

It’d taken John, Sollux and Tavros another half an hour to talk Eridan back down to the room, and then three hours of dissecting the memory, picking through every horrifying detail, turning over and over these sickening events, like beads on a string eventually Eridan had threaded them back together, and it was a story that was not pretty. From what John understood, Eridan had been fully conscious as his horns had been sawn off with a serrated knife. It made sense that Eridan’s subconscious mind had said no, that this was a memory that didn’t need reliving. Together, the three of them had put Eridan to bed, with Sollux swearing to stay awake all night just in case.

And then he’d been sent away, for Karkat, with a dire warning to _stay safe_ as his only goodbye.

That was where he found himself now, shifting his weight on the worn mat in front of Karkat’s apartment door crowned by the halo of the fluorescent lamp that buzzed a greeting at him, a long and faithful whine that had been waiting for him to come back. Eridan’s story had rung true: this door was new, to replace the one that Gamzee had battered down in pursuit of his moirail. Maybe John would have to do the same thing.

He knocked again. Fourth time now. He’d been standing here for twenty minutes. He’d paced the corridor. He’d thought about throwing rocks up at Karkat’s window – it could still come to that, he thought, pocketing his hands again in Karkat’s hoodie. He’d unearthed it from the back of his closet the other night; it had lost its smell by now. Smelled like John.

John leaned down and pushed a couple of fingers through the letterbox. All was dark in Karkat’s tiny living room.

“Karkat? Karkat, are you home? It’s me,” he called, and even as he did he figured it was probably a lost cause. They’d said he wasn’t answering the door.

After another minute or so, there was a very small reply. Just, “John?” from the other side of a closed door. John’s fingers curled into nervous fists in his pockets.

“Yeah. John,” he said back, and then the door opened. A crack. Barely.

“You don’t want to see me right now,” Karkat rasped, and hearing his voice was just so wonderful that John almost wanted to swat the door right off its hinges and grab his little matesprit right there and then.

“I always want to see you,” John said back, barely missing a beat.

“I am currently repulsive by every definition of the word.”

“I think you are probably wrong,” John replied, patient as he could, and then he noticed the fingers grasping the edge of the door. He reached out, just one hand, and padded his fingertips against Karkat’s knuckles. Hard and cold and papery. “You need company.”

“I’m not kidding, Egbert. I look like I got in a fight with a Lamplighter and lost.”

“Did you?” John said instantly, all a panic.

“No. I haven’t left…” this was followed by a tiny hiss, like Karkat just realised he’d screwed up. “My apartment. Not since the last time you were here.”

“I’m coming in,” John informed him, and shouldered the door open. Karkat gave a grunt of disapproval but he yielded, the door swung open, and John let it click shut behind him as he regarded Karkat.

He looked like someone had scooped all the life out of him and replaced it with dust, framed with shadows there in his dusky living room, he looked small, smaller than John had ever seen him, like a mouse and quaking like one, too. Sweater and boxers, that was familiar, that was heart wrenching; his knees were red. One of them was grazed. Half an image of plasters on scraped knees fluttered in his mind’s eye and John felt his fingers twitch. He couldn’t even look at Karkat’s face, couldn’t even bear it so he stared at a space to the left of his hip and tried to process this, but there was some disconnection in his brain. It had been two weeks and something had broken Karkat badly.

“What's wrong with your face?” Karkat croaked, staring at him, but John wasn't looking him in the eye to know.

"At work, I. Yeah. Karkat, what happened to you?”

John said, with a finality in his voice that said Karkat's condition was more important.

“Sorry,” Karkat said. “I kind of gave up, I.”

“You got thinner,” was all that John could think to say, and he pressed his lips together.

“I’ve been in bed a… a lot.”

He sounded so ashamed, so embarrassed, like his existence itself was mortifying. John realised it probably wasn’t helping that he was still just staring endlessly at a vague piece of stale air, so he forced himself to hitch his gaze and settle it on Karkat’s staunch frown. Chapped lips hot red with rawness and a scarlet flush cut sharp contrast to the blue slate slabs under his eyes, drooping and needled with red lines, huge-pupilled and dry. His hair was dark dandelion fluff. He looked awful, beat-down, used up.

Still, he was perfect.

“Okay. Go back to bed,” John said, being pragmatic to shield himself against the monument of hurt that was here. “I’ll come in a second.”

Karkat stared at him, but was too beat down and sore to argue, so he turned on his heel and marched on his fawn-like legs back to his bedroom. John shrugged off Karkat’s hoodie and threw it down on the sofa to lie with Karkat smell, and then lurched across the room into the kitchen. He rattled through drawers and cupboards only to find that they were all mostly dust and debris; Karkat’s icebox was empty and not even cold, but there in the back of the cupboard on top of it was his saving grace: a jar of apple sauce, unopened. When he popped the lid off, it smelled fine. Enticing, even. This was practically gourmet. He almost laughed in spite of it all, then grabbed a spoon and marched back to Karkat’s room to stand authoritatively in the doorway.

“You need to eat,” he announced, and Karkat peered at him. He was sat upright in bed, covered by the blankets, and whatever energy he had left was instantly redirected to defensive anger.

“Why?” he snapped. “What the fuck is the point, Egbert?”

“The point is that I don’t want you to die,” John spat back, not usually so quick to rise to harsh words, but there it was. He crossed the room and sat down on the edge of Karkat’s bed, mattress sagging as he did. Karkat glared at him, and John barely noticed. It was so nice to be next to him again.

“Have you considered our situation lately, you fucking idiot?” Karkat growled, as John unscrewed the lid on the applesauce and set it aside. “I’m going to die anyway.”

“You don’t know that for sure,” John said levelly, scooping out a spoonful. “Now eat the god damn applesauce.”

Karkat yielded, and with a spoon in his mouth, he burst into tears – but not many. Enough for John to count the drops.

“Hey, it’s okay,” John said, softening instantly as he put the spoon back in the jar. Karkat swallowed down apple goo as two salmon pink tears beaded down his papery cheeks, and it was so obvious that this was the ultimate indignity; his cheeks were blazing like lanterns and he locked his arms around his knees and refused to look John in the eyes. His anger was a front to keep this from happening, but he’d failed. “Karkat, I’m sorry. I really am so sorry about this. But you’re not giving up yet, I’m not going to let you. It’s not an option.”

He offered another spoon of applesauce, and Karkat stared at it through the gloss of tears sitting on his lower lids.

“This is fucking mortifying,” he choked out, but he ate the spoonful anyway.

“It’s just me, it’s alright. Hey, I’ve been spoon fed before, too,” John said, grinning. “Sometimes it’s necessary!”

“What happened?” Karkat said thickly through a mouthful of food.

“I sprained one wrist and broke the other arm. I fell off a lamppost in Lamplighter training! They almost threw me out because it was so dumb,” John said brightly, scooping out the jar again. “After they discharged me from hospital with both arms in slings, my dad had to do almost everything for me for a few days. Including feed me.”

Karkat tilted his head, chewing contemplatively on the next spoon of applesauce. He’d stopped crying moments ago, like the crack in him had been papered over by this new information. He swallowed, and then: “Your dad.”

“Uh, yeah?” John said, almost cocking his own head to mirror Karkat.

“Parental care is important in your species,” Karkat said, like he was the tutor and John the student. John bit back his laugh, and nodded. And then fed Karkat another spoonful.

“Do you not…?” he tailed off, brow furrowing. John tried not to be judgmental: trolls weren’t the same as humans, and that was fine. Besides, this line of conversation seemed to be less painful for Karkat, so he didn’t want to make a mess of it.

“No, not usually. Mothers stay until their children are weaned and then older siblings or sometimes unrelated trolls take over,” Karkat explained.

“Oh! That’s really different,” John said, setting the jar down on the bedside table. They’d managed half of it already, and John didn’t want to overdo it. “So, do you have… you know, an older brother or sister?”

Karkat faltered, but then spoke. “Yes. A brother. He’s completely fucking insufferable and I spent seventeen long years wishing he’d disappear. And then he did.”

“Oh, god,” John said, staring at him. “I’m sorry, Karkat.”

“It’s fine, I know he’s still alive. Every once in a while I get letters from him on my doorstep. They’re always at least fifty pages long. They don’t fit through the letterbox,” Karkat said, and even though he sounded disparaging, there was an irrepressible grin playing at the corners of his mouth. That was a sight to see. “And without fail he opens with four paragraphs’ worth of pep talk about our mutant blood. ‘You’re not a lesser being, Karkat. You are worthy of love’. He’s like a greetings card.”

“What’s he like? Is he crabby like you? He sounds pretty mellow,” John said, and by now he was grinning from ear to ear, too.

“Jesus fuck, he is annoying as shit. You should hear him talk, John, he’ll go for hours about crap nobody even _cares_ about.”

Maybe that was where Karkat got his ranty side from. John decided not to share this theory.

“You love him though, right?”

Karkat squirmed. “Ugh. Of course. But he’s still an asshole. And his matesprit, he’s a fucking idiot, too.”

“Matesprit, huh? Do I know him?” John said, chuckling, and Karkat shook his head.

“No. Count yourself lucky. He disappeared about the same time as K— my brother, and that’s the only way we ever hear about him,” Karkat said, quickly saving face. Secrets, again. John decided to not let it bother him. “So, what about you, Egbert? Any family?”

John shrugged. “Growing up it was just me and dad, but he’s dead now. I have a cousin but… I haven’t seen her for a while.”

Reaching out, Karkat leaned towards him, and they ended up knee-to-knee, blankets aside, two hands linked together; Karkat’s free hand found John’s bicep and John’s hand threaded into Karkat’s hair. Their movements were instinct, a dance without choreography.

“You’re alone, too,” Karkat said, and John shook his head.

“Not anymore. Not really,” John said, and then leaned forward to kiss Karkat between his eyes, and breathed in his warm cinnamon musk. Karkat’s eyes fluttered shut and he huffed, and the breath warmed John’s neck. “Eridan wants you to move in with him.”

“I know.”

“You should.”

“I know,” Karkat repeated.

“Promise that you will.”

“Yeah, okay. I need to get out of… out of… this.”

John pressed his nose against Karkat’s cheek, planted kisses in his ear, nuzzled into his soft over-long hair. Karkat's breaths grew snuffly and caught in his throat.

“John,” he said hoarsely, and John looked up. Their eyes met. Karkat’s spoke of a desperate need to feel wanted again. “Kiss me. Please.”

He didn’t need to be told twice; he pushed his lips up as gently as possible to Karkat’s, only to be completely blown over when Karkat threw his arms around John’s neck and kissed back, hard, like this was the last time he’d ever get a chance – almost all of his weight was on John’s shoulders now and John held him tight around the middle as their mouths moved together, tongues and teeth and lips all basking in the love they’d been missing – Karkat leaned into him over-hard and John toppled over backwards onto Karkat’s bed, belly up with a desperate Karkat on top of him, a warm weight pushing on his chest, hot snippets of breath against his lips and an urgent flurry of kisses.

John tried not to be alarmed, he just held Karkat as tight as he could, and then snuck his hands underneath Karkat’s shirt to feel the burning warmth of skin that had been lonely too long. Karkat’s mouth was working his neck all of a sudden, warm soft wetness sending thrills down his spine – he was tonguing the hollow of his throat – he was chewing on the spot where his neck met his shoulder –

“Karkat,” John managed to choke out. “Are you – are you okay?”

Karkat gave pause and breathed hard against John’s neck.

“I just missed you,” he managed, dragging down his hands to push up John’s shirt, pressing burning warmth against his stomach, tracing spider web lines over his ribs, making him shiver. “I just, I just _want_ you.”

It was like he was frustrated with himself, like he couldn’t wrest what he wanted out of this situation. But also, the life had just come back into him. By now John’s eyes had adjusted to the light and he could see the colour in uneven patches on Karkat’s cheeks, the fervent urgency sparkling in the yellows of his heavy-lidded eyes.

“You have me,” John said, and then Karkat was grinning: the desperation disappeared and his matesprit sank down on top of him, dissolving into a pile of sleepy chuckles and just-softened angles, and John cradled him, gently, carefully. This night was perfect. The curtains were closed: the world didn’t matter. “Hey, I have some good news.”

Karkat lifted his chin barely an inch. His eyes were almost closed and he was lolling with pleasure. John dragged the pads of his fingers up and down Karkat’s spine, half for laughs, and half because it made him move in a way that electrified John to the core.

“My boss is gonna take over the city. He called me his right hand man,” John said, like he’d just come home from work to tell his spouse how his day had been. His heart pattered. They could be like that, one day.

“That is good news,” Karkat said, eyes open suddenly and blinking at him. “My god, Egbert, you’re a genius. How did you do that?”

“It wasn’t exactly an active process, uh, my power is pretty limited,” John said, flushing. “But I’m kind of in charge of gathering support for his little resistance movement… I think I can swing this, and then I’ll be –”

“Next to the most powerful person in the city. Jesus, John, you’re a fucking godsend,” Karkat said, and then the kisses were raining down on him again, his forehead, his cheeks, his neck, his collarbones, and now his shirt was being pulled up and over his head and cast aside, and there was heat on his chest, and Karkat’s tongue snaked over the tender skin over his ribs, and teeth nipped lines up his sides, and holy shit fingers under the waistband of his jeans, oh god, what was happening, he didn’t care, it was beautiful.

“Are you okay with this?” Karkat said hoarsely, suddenly, as if he’d only just realised what he was doing. John took a breath, finally.

“This is not what I was expecting!” he admitted, still extremely aware of the fingers under his waistband, pressing warmth on tender skin. “Weren’t you crying just ten minutes ago?”

Karkat shifted on top of him, grinning, abashed, and for the first time in months he looked _young_ , dewy-eyed and flushed, tense and taut with the thrill of the situation. He was staring down at John and his eyes couldn’t settle; he traced the lines of John’s chest with his gaze, near-reverent like John was art, and then he looked John in the eyes, his pupils massive discs, his reddened lips just-parted.

“I missed you. I fucking missed you _so much_ ,” Karkat said, and John pushed himself up, shifted Karkat back so that he was sitting straddling John’s thighs and they were chest-to-chest. He curled his fingers under the hem of Karkat’s sweater and pulled it off; it joined John’s shirt, crumpled on the floor.

His mouth found a warm home in the hollow of Karkat’s neck, where he murmured, “I missed you, too.”

“We don’t have to do anything –” Karkat said, abruptly ending his sentence with a squeak as John rolled the skin of Karkat’s neck between his teeth. “John!” he panted out, fingers seizing tighter the waistband of John’s jeans.

“Do you wanna?” John said, and Karkat tried to shrug, tried to be disaffected, but John’s tongue on his collarbone had him crowing and throwing his head back. John trailed a line up Karkat’s neck with his tongue, lingering over the most vulnerable parts, pressing his lips around a point where he could feel the violent crash of Karkat’s pulse.

“Yes, god, yes,” Karkat croaked; urgent, desperate, fiercely excited, he was a quivering mess, he was gunpowder grey with bloody splashes, he was all bone and wire, he was unravelling already. John grabbed him by the wrists, pulled his hands to where he could see them, and just held them.

“I’ve never. Uh, this is my first. You’re… yeah,” John said, and grinned sheepishly. Karkat just nodded, because even if he didn’t know that for sure, he’d already taken it as a given. And then he took John’s glasses off, folded them, and put them safe on the bedside table. It was a tiny gesture but it was domesticity and care, and John wanted to marry him.

Then he pushed his hands into John’s hair, and pressed their foreheads together. “Don’t worry,” he said, a quiet rasp. “I’ll take care of you.”

John didn’t know if this was wrong or right. Lately his moral compass had been pointing a little off-centre. He had a thought then, a thought so dangerous and terrifying that it had him trembling barely the moment after it’d popped into existence. Karkat kissed him again, curled his tongue around John’s, and John groaned into his mouth – finally – and Karkat twitched in his arms, grasped harder at his hair, breathed hard through his nose – John cupped his hands around each side of Karkat’s waist and thumbed his ribs, and Karkat shook just as hard as John. Their lips broke apart, John gasped, and then it just fell out, characteristically clumsy. “I love you.”

“God, I love you, too, you fucking _asshole_ ,” Karkat said back with not half a second’s delay. John felt his heart ballooning at the thought.

John yielded to hands that pressed down on his shoulders, so that he was forced to flatten back onto the bed again, and when Karkat unzipped his jeans he happily slid out of them and let them lie with the other clothes they’d discarded, and then he shook again as Karkat arched low over him, his thighs flush to John’s, their bellies touching, his head low and lips in John’s ear. Just his breaths were enough to make John squirm underneath him, almost to whimper.

“Calm down there, kid,” Karkat said hoarsely, and John huffed an angry note in response as Karkat turned his attention to John’s chest, teeth and tongue making lines of cool moistness and needle sensations that toed the line of pain and pleasure, such tiny things, he could hardly bear being toyed with like this, and then the tip of Karkat’s tongue ghosted over his nipple then lips wrapped around it and his breath hitched and then came out in a series of unlinked moans. Karkat’s nails dug into his sides. “You are really hot,” he said against John’s chest before playing his nipple with his teeth, tracing the other with the pad of a cool finger, and by now John was electrified and so taut with tension that all he could do was curl his fingers into the bedlinen and try not to make too much noise.

And then Karkat relented, lifted his head to look John in the eyes as one hand traced a slow, teasing line down his chest, fingers splaying over his skin, hesitating at the spot where their stomachs touched. John whined, a sound he never thought would come out of him, and the grin that it elicited from Karkat was alive and delighted and his eyes were alight. Karkat sat up, and then shifted to kneel beside him for a moment as he helped John shed his boxers.

“Well,” Karkat said, and as Karkat stared at his cock, John stared at the ceiling, burning. “That is beautiful.”

Karkat sat across him again, resting on his thighs, and pressed his palms to John’s hips. John propped himself up on his elbows, then, so that he could watch as Karkat stared at him, eyes wide and wet in the lowlight.

“It’s not that impressive,” John said, with an awkward grin. Karkat caught his eye, raised one eyebrow.

“I think so,” Karkat said, and then wrapped his fingers around the shaft. “And I feel like, right now, my opinion is more important than yours.”

“M-hm,” John said, brain turning to soup. Karkat’s hand was warm, gentle, small. But firm.

Karkat pumped him a few times, slowly, lazily, like this was dull work, but even that was enough to make John’s arms feel weak and nearly buckle under his weight – Karkat grinned down at him, squeezed him, played with him. But John was watching close and, for all Karkat’s needling teasing and pretending to be in control, his underlip was trembling and his breaths were coming fast and hard. John tilted back his head and grinned stupidly up at the ceiling as he arced his back, hips pushing up against Karkat’s accommodating palm.

“You like that?” Karkat murmured, flicking his thumb over the head of John’s cock, making him twitch hard from the base of his spine.

“Yes,” John panted back immediately. “It’s… gosh.” He tilted his chin down again, elbows getting weary already with the weight of propping him up, and watched Karkat work.

Karkat was heavy-lidded, watching his hand pump John slowly, cresting his head with thumbs and fingertips, slicking his cock with precum, just warming him up. The look on his face was half as sexy as what he was doing; he was breathless, damp-eyed, every so often he’d lick his lips. He held John a little firmer, then, and quickened his pace, catching John by surprise – John gasped, the breath snagged in his throat and he moaned out loud as he bucked his hips up to push himself into a hot wet hand, and Karkat let him, held him tighter as John fucked his curled palm, eyes screwed shut tight, chest heaving, mouth hanging open and making a mess of desperate sounds –

“Jesus Karkat I can’t – you – fuck – _fuck_ –”

Karkat shuffled back, dipped his head, and took the head of John’s cock into his mouth, and John pressed his lips together at the dripping tongue rippling sensation over that slippery sensitive spot and he didn’t usually lose control of himself like this he usually had it all together, but Karkat was sucking on him and the tug and pull of his lips and the pounding of his palm – oh, god – he felt his core start to tighten and burn as something simmered inside of him, and he moaned in earnest, high-pitched and urgent; Karkat rumbled from his throat in response and tightened all that he could around John’s cock, he wasn’t going to hold out much longer, he was quivering on the edge. And then his eyes rolled back and his arms gave out and he flopped back onto the bed as he came, hard, gasping with the force of it as electricity tore through every muscle in his body. And Karkat swallowed every drop, suckling on his cock until it had softened, and tongued the head so tenderly, before kissing it goodnight.

He crawled forwards so that he could look John in the eyes again.

“Did I – was that –?” Karkat said, and John laughed, exhausted, reaching up to cup Karkat’s beautiful face with both hands.

“It was perfect,” he managed, heartbeat slowing, chest alight with warmth. “You’re amazing.”

Karkat grinned down at him. John abruptly noticed the way his collarbones made hollows when he leaned over him like this. And then he wondered what Karkat would look like, falling apart underneath him.

“Can I?” John said. And then added, “Please?”

Leaning down, Karkat pressed his lips to John’s, briefly, and John could half-taste himself on Karkat’s tongue.

“Yeah,” Karkat murmured. “But be gentle with me.”

They grinned at each other.

“Always.”

They ended up fooling around all night, with the unfettered enthusiasm of a high school couple on prom night, cut with the knowledge that this could be the first and last ever time they would be together like this. Every movement carried this weight, and every touch was important, and by morning John had lost count of the number of times they’d shared _I love you_ s. They fell asleep around six a.m., limbs all entwined together, breathing in sync by accident.

And the cogs of their grand scheme stalled, and started to fall apart.


	19. Fall

**Notes for the Chapter:**

>  **Trigger warnings:** Descriptions of serious injuries and assault, self-loathing, fire

Another week had dragged by, and John had kept his distance from the Lower City, wasting his hours away at work, ferreting out support for English’s plot to usurp the mayor. The Lamplighters had been almost unanimously supportive, and from the relieved sighs he got from a few of them, they’d been waiting for someone else to make the first move for a while. They were completely brainwashed, of course, and it made John feel physically ill to think that they wanted the trolls dead so badly.

And then at the same time he felt warm and wicked every time he thought of the scratch marks and the bite wounds that Karkat had left him, burning hot under a swathe of authoritative navy blue. The words _what are you so happy about_ had been hissed at him more than once, and each time he’d had to recollect himself from his trance-like state, staring into space and thinking of a wire-bodied man squirming underneath him, to shake his head, adjust his glasses, and mumble something non-committal.

Karkat was on his mind almost all of the time, now. If he wasn’t worrying about his matesprit, he was beyond completely elated about their relationship – and between those two poles there was a gulf of intermittent sadness. He was still doing his best to keep his head up, though. Every conversation in a shadowed corridor, every lamp that he lit, brought him a little closer to success: English would be mayor, and whatever he wanted to do with the trolls, John could warn them. They would always be one step ahead.

Given that things were going so perfectly, John felt a little stupid for not anticipating that his stable ground would crumble and collapse beneath him.

The Bazaar’s early evening mug slicked around his throat, a tangible, ever-tightening tourniquet of stale air, heavy and particulate with smoke and grime that made a greasy patina on his just-dry cleaned jacket. With sweaty palms, John pushed the dirt on his cheeks around a little, but to no avail – cheekbones anointed with filth smeared like warpaint, John soldiered on, shouldering through throngs of people, stepping on a few outraged toes and splashing ankle-deep in slicks of oily water, inlets in the ocean of ooze. His lungs worked the air like a rusted machine, tainting the back of his throat with the taste of copper and petrol.

Overhead the night had an incandescent halo, sick streamers of ochre lamplight shooting into the abyss. But this far down the people marched like ants, and the tattered awnings blocked out much light, leaving his path to be paved by the weary globes of dwindling wall lanterns. He could barely see for limb and torso and outraged ruddy face, and his frown deepened every other time he had to pointedly gesture at his identification plate. As if the people here cared that he was a Lamplighter – he was basically furniture.

Time passes, but some things never really change. John still hated the Bazaar. As he passed through the increasingly narrow and crooked alleys, like crawling deeper into the circulation of a sick beast, he brought each lantern on his way into new life with a whoosh and a pop of gas or wick lighting. Soon there was a golden thread that marked his trail for about a mile’s worth of the Bazaar’s periphery, and before long he’d penetrated so deep into the murk that he was wholly alone in a tight alley’s bend, and cold. The sweat and slick of murk were now clammy like ice on his raw cheeks, and his breath came out in a pale fug in front of his face, an amber ghost. He pocketed his lighter, done for the evening, but not before noticing shards of something shattered, strewn across the ground, gleaming in lanternlight.

It was probably just broken glass, but something willed him to investigate anyway. He bridged the twenty foot gap with long strides, boots crunching on the scraps before peering closer at the mystery beneath his feet.

This wasn’t glass at all, he realised, pushing his glasses a little further up his nose from where they’d slipped on his sweat. He leaned down to grab a piece of the mess, inspecting it in his palm – it was something metallic, one piece of a whole whose parts he could only assume were related somehow. Steel in colour, its surface was threaded with raised copper lines; he leaned down again and grabbed another piece, and found that he could press them together along a line where they’d been cracked. This had been functional, once, but obviously someone had decided otherwise. The rest of the pieces were smaller – whatever it was, it had been quite thoroughly ground down, which John thought a shame because though he didn’t know much about machinery, it certainly looked to have been made by someone with expertise.

His instinctual need for order (drummed into him by the Lamplighters) set him scooping up the scattered pieces and piling them on a piece of torn parcel paper nearby. Shame – this had been a gift for someone, perhaps, but it had never reached them. He bundled the destroyed object together within the paper, and lifted the lid of the nearby dumpster to toss it inside. He even almost didn’t double take.

He almost didn’t see what was in there, and for the next three weeks he’d lie awake and wonder what would have happened if he hadn’t taken that second look.

For a moment, he just stood there, gormless, staring down into the hollow of the dumpster. He tried to understand, but it didn’t make sense.

This wasn’t right. This wasn’t right at all, Karkat wasn’t supposed to _be_ here.

He was supposed to be living with Eridan, and he was meant to be safe there; someone should’ve been keeping an eye on him. He hadn’t been well, he hadn’t been eating right, or sleeping, so how was this possible?

John’s brain lurched as he tried to think of Eridan kicking Karkat out in the middle of the night – he would never. He tried to imagine Aradia, or Sollux, or Tavros, letting him wander off all alone when things were so dangerous, and they just wouldn’t, they _wouldn’t_.

Maybe finding Eridan the way he’d been a few weeks back had desensitised John, or maybe he was just fundamentally broken in some way now, but he didn’t even acknowledge the state that Karkat was in as he lifted him out of the dumpster, cradling him carefully in his arms, as he had many times before. Duty-bound to take Karkat somewhere safe, there was barely even a moment where he was aware what he was doing as he turned on his heel and marched back down the alleyway, letting his feet lead him through unlit, unused streets, a path that they knew would lead him to his apartment nearby without crossing another living soul.

John seemed to be watching this from about ten feet in the air, screaming down as he watched himself just go through the motions.

* * *

It’d taken him the better part of ten minutes to make his way home, and he lay Karkat down on his made bed, belly-up, before lighting a lantern on the wall that streamed down yellow light onto a face that was –

A face that –

A –

He turned his thoughts off again and lowered his cheek to Karkat’s lips. After a few seconds he could feel warm air puffing against his stinging skin: Karkat was still breathing. And as long as he was still breathing, he would be fine.

Karkat had been stripped down to his underwear. Why? John’s front was completely soaked in cherry red blood, making sick colours against indigo blue. He could hardly see grey for all the scarlet, and for a second he looked into the corner of the room where shadows played at the flickering edges of the orb cast by the lantern, breathing sharp through his nose. And slowly, he eased himself back into reality. Karkat was breathing, Karkat was alive, but he needed help.

First he threw off his bloodied jacket, and then retrieved a first aid kit from under his bed and let it lay open on the bedside table. The first thing was to clean all the blood, because there was so much of it that John could not even tell where the injuries were, and the stench rising in pungent waves was turning his stomach. Balling medical gauze in his fist, he set to work wiping away long, stubborn lines of blood; lines that were congealing at the edges, turning black, necrotic.

How long had he been lying in the trash?

John reminded himself not to think as he wiped the last of the blood from Karkat’s knees, and then took note of where he could see fresh blood welling up: under his ear, his shoulder, across his belly, a sickle-shaped slash over his collarbones – shit, that was deep – don’t think – he could see a bright pearlescent flash of bone – _don’t_ – his thighs, his knees, and he, John suddenly realised, had been stabbed through the centre of one hand, and that was seeping a bright splatter onto his bed sheet. When he pushed back Karkat’s hair he could see a bloody laceration on the side of his head, too, shooting down over his temple. And there were bruises everywhere, bruises that John would have to take note of later.

The paper-thin skin over Karkat’s chest was palpitating with the pace of his heartbeat. John knew his first aid. It was just a matter of staying sane for long enough to keep the weight of realisation at bay. He felt dizzy, but there wasn’t time for that.

With steady hands he balled up another length of gauze, soaked it in golden-brown iodine, and set to wiping down every wound. Even the deep ones were only oozing, letting up trickles of slithering blood as he swabbed them clean. Karkat’s hand was cold and limp and small in his own, and it leaked blood that painted their palms as John pushed dirt out of the open wound. He palpated the skin, rubbing for snapped tendons under his thumbs, and found none – the wound had just scraped past anything hugely vital; Karkat’s hand would probably recover. His head wound was superficial, it looked like it’d been bleeding out of proportion with its seriousness, as when John padded it with fingertips there was only a trace of new blood marking his skin. It was a cut, not blunt force trauma. A hank of his hair was missing.

The sharp bite of iodine vapours mingled with a bloody tang and turned John’s stomach. Through this, he grabbed four rolls of bandages, lay them down on the bed, and set to wrapping Karkat’s lesser wounds: he bound each of Karkat’s legs, from the knee to the middle of each thigh, where it looked like he’d been slit with a knife. His stomach injury was too deep to treat with a bandage, as was the mess across his collarbones, but John did manage to lever him slightly to coil bandages around the rough scrape over Karkat’s shoulder. He wrapped up the stab wound through Karkat’s hand, too, securing the bandage with a knot around his wrist. It was unnerving for Karkat’s limbs to be so limp and weak under his hands, and John would’ve thought he was dealing with a dead body for how Karkat’s skin felt ice cold and clammy. But he was breathing, and John could see his jugular vein flitting like the wings of an anxious bird. He was bound to live. Of course he would.

For the rest, John readied a needle and thread, shaking as he fed the thread through the eye of the needle. He forcibly dissociated himself from the sick procedure as he looped stitches in jagged, unpractised lines through the cuts on Karkat’s stomach, and under his ear. It was slippery stuff, split skin, especially with blood smearing over it. He had to pinch the skin on either side of Karkat’s collarbone to keep it in place as he forced the needle through, and it didn’t look pretty once he’d finished, either: puckered and raised in parallel with the jut of Karkat’s collarbone, he’d crafted a crooked line of scribbled stitches that would leave the most horrendous scar.

Then John set everything down. He had done all he could but to wait for Karkat to wake up; he didn’t want to roll Karkat over into the recovery position, not while he was hurt like this. Instead, John gently tilted Karkat’s head to the side, just in case, and he stared at the bruises and tried to piece together what had happened.

Karkat’s forearms were swollen and beaten, near-fluorescent with candy-bright contusions, virulent cherry red sores. He had been protecting his head, probably, from some violent and vicious assault. His waist and ribs had been battered, too, and the skin was inflated with blood pooling underneath. He had one black eye, but no broken bones that John had identified. All in all, it looked as though he would survive.

But it also looked like someone had taken a meat cleaver to him.

John stood from where he’d been kneeling at the side of the bed to sit on the edge of the mattress, twisted so that he could keep his eye trained on Karkat’s face, which was incongruously peaceful. That was just wrong: not only was it inappropriate, but Karkat was such a furious little man that it… it just wasn’t right. It was like his wick had burned out.

That was the part where John finally felt it, whatever ‘it’ was; it was even more painful than the way Eridan’s assault had severed his heart in half, he suddenly felt a leaden weight in the pit of his stomach and it was like his insides weighed a ton and somehow they were all clamouring to jump out of his throat at the same time. He mumbled a jumble of curses under his breath, choking on nothing, and lay his hand down on the left side of Karkat’s chest.

His heart had slowed down, at least, from the wild patter it’d been keeping up before. John reminded himself that everything was fine. He’d fixed Karkat. He’d been there in time. Soon Karkat would wake up – that was the worst part of all this, knowing that Karkat was here-but-not, that he’d come back soon and have no idea where he was, that he’d have to relive the whole thing. But John was with him. If only he’d shown up sooner, John kicked himself; if only he’d been there – but that was what he did. He couldn’t even control the damage – he was always one step too slow, he always just let it fucking happen, and ended up picking up the pieces of a problem that he _should have been there to prevent._

“I’m sorry,” he said. “Karkat, I am so sorry.”

Karkat took a breath that was slightly deeper than the others he’d rasped, and John stiffened. Some instinct told him to keep talking.

“You’re safe now. It’s just me here. We’re in my apartment,” John said, watching Karkat’s face carefully. “I think you are probably hurting, but once you wake up I can give you something for that.”

His chest ached.

“I am not too sure what happened to you, but it’s over now, whatever it was. No one is going to hurt you like that when I’m here.”

_But you already let it happen._

“Can you hear me?” John said, and Karkat’s fingers twitched, and John nearly jumped three feet in the air, but stilled himself. “Karkat?”

A muscle in Karkat’s jaw had started jumping, and John watched as Karkat grit his teeth and his lip curled, and he let out a hiss of pained, trapped breath, and groaned in agony, barely able to move his limbs – but he did open one eye, the one that wasn’t wearing an enormous scarlet bruise, to a narrow yellow slit. This was followed by a beaded tear snaking out of its corner, and Karkat promptly shut his eye again, and didn’t say a thing.

In another few moments’ time he was sobbing, but it was clipped and measured because he was so broken, so his chest barely rose and fell at all but the tears were certainly coming, streaming down to wet his temples, mixing with blood to dye them deeper red and dripping into his ears. John couldn’t even hold him properly because it only would have hurt him more, so he just pressed his hand a little harder over Karkat’s vibrating sternum.

“Is it the pain? Do you want a painkiller?” John said, and Karkat gasped.

“F-f-f-fuck,” was all that he could spit out, and John groped around on the bedside table for a pillbox of painkillers. He fed two of the tablets to Karkat, who managed to swallow them dry in the time it took for John to grab him a cup of water.

“Drink, too,” John said, and pressed the rim of the cup against Karkat’s raw lips. He drank, gulping down water like it was the first time he’d seen it in weeks – he drained the cup in seconds and John set it down, only to find that none of this had stayed Karkat’s tears.

John reached over him and took hold of the hand that wasn’t wrapped in a bandage, curling his fingers around it in a protective shield.

“Do you remember what happened?” he said, shocked that his voice had dropped down to a rasping whisper. Karkat finally cracked one eye open again, and pointed a sliver of red-ringed pupil in John’s direction. The breaths heaved in the back of his throat and his chest quivered wildly with the effort.

“Yes,” Karkat whispered in reply, and John nodded. He had to keep it together, even as his heart was falling apart inside him.

“Okay. It’s over now, see? You’re safe here,” John said, and then from under the bed he groped for a spare blanket that he draped over Karkat’s prone body, half-wondering again why he’d been stripped down to his underwear. The entire situation made John feel sick with anger. Karkat whined and curled his good hand into the blankets, and John tucked him carefully up to his chin.

“I’m – sorry –” Karkat choked, and John shook his head instantly.

“You haven’t done anything wrong,” he said, smoothing down Karkat’s hair, over his horns. Karkat shook. “This isn’t your fault.”

“You don’t understand,” Karkat squeaked, and his face screwed up again, and his sobs came out in little pants of anguished breath. John didn’t know what to do, he’d never seen Karkat looking so awful, so he just leaned down and kissed him on the forehead. Karkat relaxed an inch or two, and the force of his shaking was dampened just a little; he tilted up his head and whined, and John pressed his lips fleetingly to Karkat’s. He tasted like blood underneath him.

“I want to know what happened,” John said lowly, kissing Karkat again on the corner of his mouth. “Take your time.”

Whoever did this was going to die a violent and bloody death. John had never thought of himself as a vengeful soul, but this was life now.

“I got attacked,” Karkat ground out, another tear slipping down his face. John gently padded it away with his fingertips, keeping his chest low over Karkat’s, their faces an inch apart. He understood by now that in grief, all Karkat wanted was closeness.

He waited.

“They – men – three of them. Tried to kill me. But,” Karkat spat out, agonised, literally squirming underneath John with the pain of the memory or the embarrassment of admitting it, John couldn’t tell, but he could feel his knuckles were whitening where he was gripping the blankets in abject fury. “Wanted – to – torture me first.”

Then Karkat took a massive gasp and both eyes flew open, sick yellow globes like snakes’ eyes, staring endlessly at a void above John’s forehead. His jaw hung slack and he rasped at air, rattling the bones in his weary chest.

“What did they do?” John dared to ask, cupping Karkat’s cheek with one hand.

“Cornered me. Took my clothes, first, took everything,” Karkat said, “Then got me on the ground, and they had knives, and… kicked me a lot, and shoved me against the wall, pinned my wrists back, and, and, my hand, my hand –”

“It’s okay,” John said, as Karkat’s brows knitted and he started worrying the verge of hyperventilation, “Your hand is gonna be fine. You are gonna be fine.”

“It hurt so much,” Karkat whispered, and John nodded gravely.

“It’s over now. You’re here, and it’s just me. And I would never hurt you.”

Karkat sniffed.

“I love you, and you are so brave,” John said, voice cracking and for once he didn’t even care. Karkat’s lip trembled.

“I fucked up,” Karkat whimpered. “I’m a failure.”

“You didn’t fuck up anything –”

“I did,” Karkat’s voice croaked back.

“How?”

And then John had a sudden thought.

“What were you doing in the Upper City, anyway?”

Karkat’s lips pressed together in the way that they did when he wasn’t sure if he wanted to lie or not.

“Don’t tell me a lie,” John whispered, and Karkat tried to drag one hand up from out of the blanket but he couldn’t, so he settled for tucking his chin to his chest in an attempt to hide his face.

“I was supposed to be delivering something.”

“I saw that,” John said, thinking of the shattered machine. “They took it from you and broke it?”

“Yeah,” Karkat whispered. “Because I’m p-pathetic, weak, and got thrown in the trash like the piece of shit I am –”

“You are not a piece of shit,” John insisted, kissing Karkat softly on his cut temple, trailing kisses over his cheekbones, down to his jaw. “You’re not.”

“I lost the package. I – fucked up everything,” Karkat said, at first frantic and strained but by the end he’d sunk back into the mattress, lip curling in defeated self-hatred.

John lay one arm, protective but gentle, over Karkat, and shifted further on the bed so that he was lying beside his matesprit cocooned in blankets, awkwardly leaning his weight on an elbow, lips in Karkat’s hair, near a horn.

“The thing that they stole from you. Is it replaceable?” John said, and Karkat tensed under his arm, and then unravelled, to consider this.

“Yeah,” Karkat eventually said.

“So it doesn’t matter what happened to it. I do not even care about the package anyway. I just care that you’re safe,” John said firmly, and Karkat took his first healthy breath in hours.

“You saved my life,” he whispered, not looking John in the eye.

“That is just a thing that I do,” John said back, thinking of Eridan, and smiling a little bit.

“I – you know I really –” Karkat said, and then cut himself off, muttered _fuck_ in an undertone and said, “John, I love you. I. I spend every second of my fucking life terrified that I’m going to die. I really thought I was done for today. And the whole time all I could think of was that I’m so fucking lucky to know you.”

“We are both lucky, I think,” John said, and Karkat thought on this, and then nodded. “Does it still hurt?”

“Less, now,” Karkat murmured, and John then gave himself permission to shuffle underneath the blanket, where Karkat had created a pocket of intense warmth. “Get out of my blanket, you shithole,” Karkat rasped, but tilted as best he could to face John, anyway. He was half-grinning, a blade-sharp tooth peeking out.

“It actually is my blanket, Karkles,” John said, and under its cover he laid one big hand on Karkat’s waist, which was burning hot under his palm – normal temperature for Karkat, a relief.

“Don’t call me that,” said Karkat, but he loved it really. Obviously. John let his head sink down onto the pillow, shuffling to be closer to Karkat, mindful of his every wound. Karkat made an uncertain noise in his throat, and then said, “I’m worried about my hand.”

“I checked it out,” John said quickly. “The tendons are all undamaged. It’ll heal. It might not… be exactly the same as before.”

“Yeah,” Karkat breathed, and then nudged his face a little closer to John’s neck. John yielded to him, scooping him nearer so that he could nestle onto the surface of John’s collarbones. They were both mostly clean of blood, and soft, and warm. Soon, he said, “Part of me wishes they’d killed me.”

“Why?”

“It’s just… I’m fucking overjoyed to be here, John, but it’s not ideal, is it?”

“I guess not,” John said, sighing into Karkat’s hair.

“I think they knew that killing me would’ve been mercy,” Karkat said, muffled into John’s shirt. “They were having a lot of… fun.”

“How long…?”

“An – an hour, maybe two. I’m not sure. Every time I tried to run they’d trip me. They gagged me with my shirt and –”

He shook his head, not able to continue, and John couldn’t hold him as close as he wanted to or he’d break him over again.

“It’s over, now.”

“When’s it going to happen again, John? Because you know it is.”

“Not right now. That’s what’s important, okay. Think about this, here, now. You and me.”

“But what about –”

“Karkat, look. We’re together, in my bed,” John said, softly. “Who would’ve thought that this could ever happen?”

Karkat shifted. “It’s nice here.”

“I don’t spend so much time here anymore,” John said, “It’ll be nice, when this is all over. Maybe you could – well.”

“Maybe I could what?”

“Maybe you could, you know. Come and. If you wanted to, I mean, then you could. Yeah.”

“What are you talking about?” Karkat teased, but he sounded exhausted – with good reason. He looped an arm over John’s waist and padded the small of his back.

“I was just thinking that someday we could live together. Maybe not here, if you didn’t want to, but uh, yeah.”

“I – what – live with you?” Karkat spat out, flustered.

“Um, yeah, it’s kind of a dumb idea, I. You know.”

Karkat was quiet for a moment; so quiet that John could hear his clock ticking. And then, in a tiny voice: “That would be perfect.”

Grinning, a little in delight and mostly in disbelief, John said, “Yeah. I think it would be.” And then he said, “There are these houses that look over the floating gardens in –”

“How long have you been thinking about this?” Karkat said, grinning hugely into John’s neck. John felt the heat pour into his cheeks.

“Uh, you know, a… a while…”

Karkat stifled his chuckle into a yawn as he curved from the very base of his spine, pressing his chest hard against John’s. “I think the pills made me tired,” he said, flattening back against the bed, curling what he could in over himself and smothering him and John both in blankets.

“Yeah, you’ll sleep like a baby,” John said, and Karkat huffed happily.

“I haven’t slept in a few days… it’ll be nice,” Karkat said, and his eyelids fluttered, but then he said, “Is it safe? To sleep here?”

“I don’t get visitors. You can sleep,” John said. “I’ll make dinner when you wake up.”

It was quite late in the day by now, around ten, and while trolls operated on a nocturnal cycle usually, Karkat looked about ready to drop – and he did, there in John’s arms, fall asleep approximately seven seconds after acknowledging that he was exhausted.

“You’re perfect,” John whispered in the quietest of voices, to the top of Karkat’s snoozing head.

John could risk a nap too, if he wanted, but whenever Karkat was hurt or vulnerable it just seemed right to stay awake. There was nothing in this apartment that could injure either of them, but John stayed up all the same, staring alternately out of the window and down at Karkat’s curled, sleeping body. He was something incredibly beautiful in the low lanternlight, lit by streams of glowing dust, coloured deep mahogany and gold and charcoal; John was completely smitten. The rise and fall of his chest had smoothed out now; his breath barely caught, and he was looking much better than he had when John had found him in the dumpster. It didn’t escape him that they were both massively blessed that Karkat was still alive.

The gentle bob of Karkat’s breaths, warm puffs on the skin of his neck, did almost have John nodding off after an hour or so; his eyelids were fluttering and his head swimming, so when John smelled smoke, he wasn’t entirely sure what was going on for a few moments. His first thought was that he needed to _not wake Karkat_ under any circumstances unless absolutely necessary, so he slid out of bed, managing to barely sag the mattress as he got up. Then he padded around the room, following his nose as he desperately tried to figure out where on earth that acrid burning stench was coming from – he gently eased open his front door and looked both ways down the corridor, but there was nothing out there. Back in his apartment, he crossed the room, and pulled the curtains a little wider open to look out into the city.

All was normal in the Upper City.

But… about a mile away, he saw it, a thick plume of smoke, incandescent from within with the sick light of lantern and flame – hovering directly over the Lower City.

In about thirty seconds, heart in his throat, he’d changed into jeans and a hoodie, wrapped a scarf around his face, thrown his hood up, and scrawled a note to Karkat in the event that he woke up and didn’t notice the fires that, by now, seemed to be burning fiercely.

_karkat, i have to head to work to sort out a few things. i should be back soon. please stay where you are, it’s safe. i love you!_

And then he was out the door and on the streets in a moment.


	20. Only Ashes

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter contains the **death of a named character**.
> 
>  **Trigger warnings:** Extreme and detailed violence and gore, fire/arson, suffocation, numerous murders and deaths, guns, discussion of self-loathing and self-harm

Breathless, John hit the pavement at a sprint and didn’t stop. Afforded cover by night-time and the absence of citygoers he could run unfettered, unquestioned, and he did, passing under the spectres of humming lanterns rippling sulphur yellow over his whitening skin, oh god, what was happening, oh god, and he had left Karkat alone; his boots crashed down into a puddle that spattered up to his knees, seeping black into the fabric of his jeans. In a second he was passing under the arch marking the entrance into the Barracks, in what felt like half a heartbeat’s time he was cutting through the marble-lined streets of the Athenaeum, breathing heavy thick air with a throat lined with razorblades and his lungs were searing the whole time, and his heart felt like it might leap out of his mouth altogether, and the whole while the plume of smoke was only swelling in girth and height, shooting for the city ceiling even as it melted under its own weight and crashed waterfalls of vile ash over the Lower City.

He was close, now, close enough to smell it as he pounded through the streets of the Brume which were waking up to the stench of smoke; windowpanels lit up in glaring orange and curtains tugged aside to feature hundreds of staunch pale faces staring down at him like a bat out of hell sprinting with every ounce of energy he had left, and he was lucky he’d thought to wrap himself up, lucky he’d concealed his face, because he was out in the open here. And he wasn’t thinking, he was only breathing and forcing one leaden foot in front of the other because for the first time ever he might actually arrive somewhere in time to stop the tragedy.

It was without a second’s hesitation that he footed it up the barricade, hand coming down hard on razor wire – he gritted his teeth against the pain as metal bit into his skin but he hauled himself up all the same, forcing a deeper gash into his skin that shot with a pain like he was being pinched, and he didn’t care. Landing with a thump on the other side of the border John was off like a rocket again, careering at full pelt down the hill, lungs pumping like bellows and heart pounding like a drum as he thundered into a city that was already bright with light and sick with screams.

Trolls and humans alike were tearing around yelling, sobbing, in confusion and in terror; windows were smashed and gaping and glass was scattered everywhere and John could only run past in search of someone that he recognised; strangers staggered by clutching their own wounds, leaning on each other, pushing aside the tangles of fallen lanternlines – and he realised then that he still hadn’t seen the flames – and then he rounded a corner and, there.

The whole street was alive with the dance of orange light and the roar of flame as a building blazed at its middle, lit from within like a ghastly bonfire. It was someone’s home, it was a troll home, there was a crowd of people standing outside and John shouldered through them only to spot Eridan standing at the front looking stricken. In his arms he held what looked like a child, clutching hard to his front, his wrongly-buttoned shirt.

“Eridan, what’s going on?!” John cried, and Eridan looked at him, wide-eyed.

“Who the fuck are – John!” he spat out, “I got no fuckin’ idea! Most of us just got up. I dunno where anybody is, I ain’t got a clue how this whole thing started, there’s humans runnin’ around all over the fuckin’ place – look, take the lil’ one back to the Livin’ Room, it’s still safe there.”

Then a young troll was thrust into his arms and John cradled the girl as gently as he could with his arms shaking, cupping the back of her head with one huge hand.

“What –”

“This was their house. Her older sister…” Eridan said, and then shook his head. “Get outta here. That’s an order.”

He was second-in-command of the city, John suddenly recalled, and he felt like he’d been punched in the gut as he nodded curtly and left at speed, tucking his charge’s head under his chin so that her view would be only of his neck and not of the carnage that rolled out around them – streets running with blood, blackened eyes in torched faces, bodies dragged out of burning buildings and the rumble as they collapsed cut with the anguished wails of those still inside – and those holding out hope that they would make it.

John felt sick. The girl was crying by now and John tightened his arms around her, made soothing sounds in her ears between his breaths through the wool of his scarf, clipping his pace to an urgent trot so as not to jog her too much. She didn’t know what was going on. They had all just woken up, and already the death toll was climbing.

Before long, they had escaped the flames, outside of the perimeter of the blaze. People sprinted past in the direction of the fires holding buckets of water that sloshed, and not a single eye was turned in his direction. John soon arrived at the door to the Living Room only to find it propped open and complete with a hasty scrawl in chalk that read _Infirmary_.

“Here we are,” John said, voice hoarse, to the girl in his arms. She looked up at him, finally, the yellows of her eyes piercingly bright against the coal black-stained sheen of her ashy skin. She had beany little horns that reminded him painfully of someone he could not afford to think of right now. John toed open the door and rushed down the staircase, shouldering through the door at the bottom to find Rose alone in a room full of wounded.

All the tables and chairs were pushed to the edges of the room, freeing up floorspace for at least a dozen people already.

“Just a moment,” Rose said, her voice high-pitched and strained with the effort of dragging a fully grown male troll, unconscious, across the floor. John set down the girl on a table at the edge of her room where she perched obediently, before sprinting over to relieve Rose, taking the troll under his arms and dragging him to where a pillow had been set down for him, watched attentively the whole while by Rose.

“Thank you, stranger,” she breathed, and then John raised an eyebrow before pulling down his hood and scarf to reveal his tousled hair and grim expression. “Oh! John, thank the heavens.”

John had never seen her look so distressed. She was covered in blood of all shades so that the whites of her eyes popped violently against her smeared skin. Her hair was whipped out of place, blonde streaked with colours, and even as she hunkered down to wrap a bandage around the male troll’s arm, she shook.

“Karkat is much better at this, but we haven’t found him yet,” she said, “And others are unaccounted for.”

“Karkat’s safe, he’s asleep in my apartment,” John said, as he crossed the room to pick up the little girl again. “Rose, what is going on?! I saw Eridan on the way here, he gave me this girl to bring to you, and he has no idea what’s happening!”

“Is she injured?”

“I don’t know! _Rose!_ ” John snapped, before setting the girl down on a free pillow on the floor.

“The city is on fire. That is all I can tell you. I don’t know whether it’s an accident or whether someone came to burn us down,” Rose said back, her voice more level now, expression staunch and stony as she tightened the bandage around a wound that was oozing purple. “It started about half an hour ago. We have only just mounted our response.”

“Why are you the only person here?” John insisted, before fixing his attention on the little girl. He had never been particularly good with children. “Does it hurt anywhere?”

She nodded, gestured to her torso, then her mouth.

“It hurts to breathe?”

Another nod.

“I don’t have a clue where anyone else has gone. Kanaya told me to stay as she left and I have yet to see anyone else –”

“She says it’s hurting her to breathe.”

“Smoke inhalation. There’s nothing we can do, we don’t have any oxygen – Karkat would know – Karkat would – why is Karkat not _here?!_ ”

“Rose, please, try to keep it together,” John pleaded, mostly for his own sake. “Karkat is safe. What can we do for smoke inhalation?”

“Nothing but keep her here in the cleaner air. Moisten a bandage and wipe her face down, check for injuries,” Rose said, moving on to splinting the arm she’d just bandaged.

“Right,” John said, snatching up a nearby bandage and wetting it from a dish bowl full of water, before wringing it out. He dabbed gently at the girl’s cheeks and she didn’t so much as whimper, but she did wince as John swabbed dirt aside to reveal flaring burns that were rippling with blisters. “Okay, just hold this over your face,” John said, and she pressed her little hands over the bandage. “You’re very brave.”

No wonder it hurt her to breathe; it looked like she’d been inhaling burning hot smoke. John hoped that a cold compress would help. He felt so powerless.

Just then was what sounded like a commotion upstairs, and Rose jerked her head up in alarm, hands pausing as they tended a wound.

“What’s that?” John said, listening hard. Voices that he recognised, growing louder as feet crashed down the stairs.

The door swung open to reveal Terezi and Feferi in the doorframe; Terezi was leaning against Feferi but not hard, and they stepped aside to let through Gamzee, whose facepaint was smudged, and in his arms was a limp Kanaya, muddied with the jade green of her own blood, blinking her huge eyes and breathing hard. Rose’s expression grew stony.

“What happened to her?” she said, her voice ice cold as she tied the final knot in the bandage of her patient. John didn’t get to his feet, afraid to leave the little girl.

“She was dragging survivors from a burning building when it collapsed,” Feferi said. “Gamzee rescued her from beneath a fallen beam. We think her collarbones are broken.”

“Must you talk about me like I’m not in the room?” Kanaya said, and her usually velvet voice was hoarse and clipped with pain. “Now put me down.”

“Chill the motherfuck out, lil’ lady,” Gamzee said, being exceedingly careful not to jostle her in his arms as he lay her down, in the middle of the room, head on a pillow. Rose dashed over to her as Terezi picked her way between people lying prone on the floor to stand beside John; she gave him a brisk slap on the shoulder.

“I’ll deal with the kid!” she chirped, leering at him from behind the scarlet glass of her goggles, and grinning delightedly.

“How are you still smiling?” John said, as he picked himself up.

“Gotta keep sane somehow!” she said. “Feferi wants to speak to you.”

“Sure,” John said, and as he turned his back he heard –

“Hey, little girl! You smell just like strawberries.”

“Not smoke?”

“Not one bit. You wanna know how I know?”

He couldn’t quite suppress his smile even as he approached Feferi, who was now standing with Gamzee at the edge of the room. She looked thunderous and angry, whereas he looked mostly dazed and confused, which was about normal. The mood had somehow lightened as conversation took the room – Rose and Kanaya, Terezi and the girl, and those lying nearby who were able began to join in.

“Where is Karkat?” Feferi immediately demanded of him, and John folded his arms.

“In my bed,” he replied curtly, and she nodded, eyes narrowing.

“Sorry to be in a bad mood,” she said, “But my city is burning down.”

“Right!” John said immediately, and unfolded his arms. “Sorry, I’m being a dick. Kinda stressed out too.”

“What’s Karkat doing in your bed?” Feferi said, and Gamzee very slowly turned his head.

“I, uh, found him in a dumpster. He got beat up.”

Feferi’s eyes flew open, but before she could speak, Gamzee said: “Beat up? Which unholy motherfucker put their fists all up on my lil’ diamond dude?”

“Gamzee, that’s not really –”

“I don’t know,” John said, “I found him after they went. They were human though. Three men.”

Gamzee sucked his teeth. “Alright,” was all he said, which seemed a bit out of character. His eyes had darkened.

“Anyway!” Feferi snipped. “I’ve sent Sollux and Tavros to Vriska’s warehouse, to set up hydraulics so we can start putting fires out with some kind of force. Are you armed, John?”

“Obviously,” John said.

“Good. Leave, now, and cover them. They should be alright but I’m concerned; we can’t afford to lose them.”

“Right. I don’t want to leave Rose on her own,” John said.

“We’re all going to stay here. The others are out fighting or helping.”

“Fighting?”

“Humans did this. They’re still running around, setting things on fire. Or slowly dying from their own injuries,” Feferi said, her lips curling to a snarl. “I told our people to speed up the process. You might want to keep your head down. We’re engaging humans on sight.”

“This is some serious shit,” Gamzee said, which lightened the mood almost instantly. John wrapped his scarf around his face again, leaving just his eyes showing, and tugged his hood back up. Feferi smeared some of the soot and ash around his face a bit.

“You’re dirty enough to pass for a troll, I would say,” Feferi said. “Just don’t go causing any trouble.”

“Whatever you say, boss,” John said, and she smiled, a little.

“Good. You’re relieved. Get out of here.”

John tugged at the strings of his – no, Karkat’s – hoodie, to tighten it a little around his face, before turning on his heel and striding out of the room, pounding up the stairs, and then rushing out of the front door just before two strangers limped through. He’d been to Vriska’s warehouse a few times before to train Karkat on the shooting range, so he knew the way well enough; he took a left at the end of the street and kept going, not in the direction of the amber blaze flickering light, but away from it, where the city was still cool and the streets mostly empty.

And then he heard two gunshots and spent bullets clinking to the ground, and he took off on instinct at a sprint towards the source of the noise, heart bounding. Soon, in the neon glare of a bare wall lamp, he could see the outline of a tall, sharp figure.

“Stay the fuck where you are or you’re getting pumped full of lead too, buddy,” she snarled, pointing a gun at John without so much as looking at him, eyes still fixed to the dead body on the ground. Just in case he picked himself up and started moving again.

“Vriska, I’m John,” he said, and Vriska lowered her gun – not like it was the first time she’d ever pointed a gun at him.

“Are you going to the warehouse?” she said, just before firing another shot to the dead man’s head. John did not look as his brain unpleasantly splattered on the pavement. He didn’t ask her if that was necessary: she clearly wasn’t in the mood to be fucked with.

“Yeah,” John said, and she finally turned to look at him, grinning as he approached her.

“Alright! Tavros and Sollux were headed there about half an hour ago, to get some hydraulics going – oh, fuck!”

John didn’t notice what had cut her off for a second, and then realised that out of an alleyway, someone was pointing a gun at her. She dropped to the ground and a split second later a bullet shattered the window behind her, and John literally didn’t even have the time to touch his guns before she’d fired two shots and left the stranger dead.

“Get outta here,” she panted, as she picked herself up, and John nodded, starting off past her. “They need more help than I do!”

It was further away than John had remembered; in another ten minutes’ time he was still running, and he hadn’t seen another soul since Vriska. After twenty minutes, though, he heard an enormous, violent sound from the direction of the warehouse and barely a minute later a person ran past him in the opposite direction – sprinting, even, their face bright white and terrified. John stuck out his leg to trip them because they were a human, and they went crashing to the ground, limbs flailing, and before they could pick themselves up John’s booted foot came down hard on their upper back.

“What are you doing here?” he demanded, finding that he was shaking in spite of himself. He was a Lamplighter, but he’d never had to do anything quite like this.

“Get off me, you bastard, I didn’t do anything –”

“What was that noise just now?!”

The stranger growled furiously, but John’s foot – now on the back of his neck, threatening to grind his face into the pavement – convinced him that speaking was worthwhile.

“A bomb, now let me up!” he spat back from where his face was mashed against the pavement, bleeding.

John’s heart dropped, and he didn’t even think about shooting the guy, or anything – if he ran off in that direction, Vriska would find him, anyway – he was off in an instant, heart skipping beats out of sheer terror. This part of the city wasn’t on fire, yet, and he had to make sure it stayed that way – and Sollux and Tavros were nearby, and they needed protection.

A few minutes later he whipped around the corner to see that the warehouse was smouldering; Nepeta and Equius stood outside, holding a thick firehose that seemed to lead directly back into the building. Sollux sat slumped near the entrance, and once John drew up to them he could see the honey yellow of blood seeping from several of his wounds.

“John!” Nepeta squeaked, turning to face him as she supported the weight of the hose for Equius, who pointed it where flames still gnawed at timber. John had once again arrived too late. “Someone threw a bomb at us! Just as we finished assembling this!”

She shook the length of hose in her hands, for emphasis.

“Where’s Tavros?!” John snapped at the nearest person, who was Sollux. He was badly injured, worse than John had thought, but he didn’t have time to think about that.

“In there,” Sollux rasped back, almost managing to lift a finger to point at the warehouse.

“Right,” John said, and without even half of a second thought he plunged into the crumbled building.

It didn’t look a thing like it once had; part of the roof had entirely caved in to let in dull lanternlight and everywhere were scattered beams and rubble that still fell – the whole place was flame-scarred and charred black and it reeked of smoke, of something acrid and burning that hurt his lungs to huff but he couldn’t afford to stop to cough. Just inside of the entrance stood a whirring machine that John couldn’t understand the workings of, but it was pumping water to fill firehoses that led outside; Sollux and Tavros had done good. Their engineers. They couldn’t afford to lose anyone.

He spotted Tavros’ wheelchair, gleaming silver out of the cloud of ash and debris falling. He couldn’t have been blasted far, surely.

“Tavros?” John called. “Tavros!”

John went on, pushing beams out of his way, sweeping aside wreckage, kicking past the remnants of Vriska’s gun closet – memories of holding Karkat’s hands hard, brushing nervously at the tips of his hair, hit John like a sledgehammer – and he still couldn’t see Tavros anywhere. Fear flooded him for the hundredth time today; he could be buried, trapped, he could’ve been torn to pieces by the blast –

“Tavros?!” John yelled again, his voice strangled and desperate, and this time he got a response.

“Help.”

He swivelled to face the direction of the tiny voice and bounded on, shoving aside debris with all his strength, driving splinters into his palms. He groaned with the effort but continued, and then spied what looked like a muddied grey arm sticking out from under a few fallen beams.

“There you are!” John yelped and sprinted towards the pile, hauling the beams aside – they were red-hot and blistered his fingers but he did not care – they fell around him and with each one he removed he could see more of their poor friend, trapped – by his own body and by the wreckage crushing him.

His elation died fast.

Tavros was hurt.

Tavros was badly, badly hurt.

John threw the last beam aside and hunkered down despite his instincts. His stomach dropped, leaving an ice cold cavern inside of him.

“It’s John,” was all he could think to say, and then he pulled down his scarf, threw off his hood, so Tavros could see him. That was important, right now. That was really, really important.

Tavros fixed him with huge amber eyes. One of them could not point in the right direction.

“Hi, John,” he managed, rasping, chest pounding with the effort. John couldn’t look further than Tavros’ chest. Something was very wrong. “It kinda hurts.”

“I bet,” John said, breathing hard to control his urge to hyperventilate. He needed to look to understand what to do but he couldn’t bring himself to.

“What does it – look – like?” Tavros groaned, and John knew that he had to.

He turned his head, carefully, keeping his eyes on Tavros’ face at first before finally pointing his gaze to his friend’s stomach, which had been ripped wide open somehow, and he didn’t need to look much further than the gaping hole and the pool of chocolate blood and all the white sheen of shattered bone to understand that Tavros was not going to be okay. Even if John dragged him out of this alive.

“It doesn’t look great,” John decided to say, looking back into Tavros’ eyes. The smoke was clearer, here, it was easier to breathe, to ignore the gnawing pain.

“I’m gonna die,” Tavros said. “Right?”

John took two deep, quick breaths, cursed his pounding heart, bit his lip, and tried to keep calm.

“Yeah,” he said. “Yeah, I think so.”

Tavros couldn’t nod, but he blinked. Twice. His one working eye swivelled to focus on a gun holstered at John’s hip.

“John, um, can you – can you –”

“You want me to…”

Oh god, what was the word, even?

“Put me out of my misery,” Tavros winced.

“I can do that,” John said, softly as possible, before slipping a gun from its holster.

He tried his hardest to remember a time that he still thought they would get out of this unscathed, and how it had felt so good, back then. Then he pressed the muzzle of his gun to Tavros’ bloodied temple. Tavros flinched as best he could with all his broken bones.

“Hey, there, it’s alright,” John forced out, other hand now on instinct tracing fingertips the length of one of Tavros’ huge horns. He was covered in sticky amber syrup. Still stank like copper and puke. It was alright it was alright everything was going to be okay and he only had to believe it for a few minutes. Long enough for Tavros.

“Will – it – hurt?” Tavros breathed, and John said quickly and firmly, “No.”

This quietened him, and Tavros sank into a tangled curl of snapped bone and chocolate blood. John’s fingers circled his cracked horn and even through all the hurt this elicited the tiniest of happy sounds, a miniscule lilt of pleasure. Contentment.

“You ready?” John barely whispered, and Tavros looked up at him with one wide eye, wet and huge like a child’s, the sweetest honey brown. John didn’t want to say goodbye, yet. But… they were all damned either way.

“Can, um, you – can you tell Jade that… you know.”

“Yeah. Yeah, of course I’ll tell her,” John said softly, and he could feel his heart grinding out a beat but he’d never felt less alive.

Still he padded his fingertips along that cracked and bloodied horn, and he didn’t, couldn’t, rip his eyes from Tavros’. Because it was the last time Tavros would ever look back at him. Last time he’d ever get to hear that stuttery stumbling little voice. He’d never get to watch Tavros and Jade blush at each other across the room again. And he would have to tell Jade that all of the things that she thought could’ve happen… were never going to be.

It wasn’t really like murdering him, though.

“Okay. You can, um. I… I’m ready to go.”

It was setting him free.

“I love you, okay? And we’ll never forget about you.”

Because whatever was going to happen… it was going to be worse.

Worse than this.

The whip-crack of a single shot snapped out into the burning city.

John never broke promises. Tavros felt no pain.

He thought of firing a shot through his own head and following his poor friend into the night, an idea so alien that his thoughts tripped and staggered. Half an image of Karkat’s face flickered in his mind’s eye. Didn’t want that there. Just one more than he couldn’t save. Chalk lines, tallies of his failings started shifting at the border of his mind and his hand _twitched_ on the fucking _gun_ and then he heard Eridan yelling, suddenly, and no, he had to live, tonight, he had to live. John Egbert didn’t give up on anything, not while there were people left to save.

He forced himself upright, and then looked down once more on Tavros. He looked at peace, now, which was the only gift John could have offered him. There was a pain in his heart like it was being ripped in half, but John couldn’t stay with him any longer.

A massive creak and the sound of a thousand splinters heralded a beam that crashed down from the ceiling then, sending razors of burning wood flaring in every direction – John yelped in pain as something tore into his cheek, and then he realised that Tavros was gone in a cloud of smoke and flame. He felt sick, but then there was Eridan, and whether that was sweat or tears on his face John never knew; Eridan grabbed him hard by the wrist and pulled him bodily out of the smoking building, nearly wrenching his arm out of its socket.

“Are you completely out of your fucking mind?!” Sollux howled from his lookout on the ground, gesticulating fiercely at Eridan which sent a spray of ochre blood in their direction. “Wait…”

They didn’t have Tavros.

“Tavros is dead,” Eridan said, and he sounded half-dead himself, empty, sullen, done. “He was hurt too bad. John shot him to end the sufferin’.”

Then Eridan turned to John again.

“Keep it together, John. We’ll talk about things once everyone’s safe. ‘Til then we have to –”

“Keep going. I know,” John said, finally re-holstering his gun.

“Good. Listen, Dave’s missin’ and nobody’s seen ‘Radia, neither,” Eridan said, and then put two fingers in his mouth and whistled sharply. Bec came barrelling around the corner in an instant, sprinting at them: a good dog.

“Find ‘em.”

Bec barked once at John and just having him around lifted his spirits an inch – whatever Jade had done to this dog, he was magical. 

“You two stay here,” Eridan said to Nepeta and Equius, and they nodded. “More should be along in a while to help with puttin’ out the fires in the rest of the city. I’ll take Sol back to the Living Room… John, see you there later, alright?”

“Sure thing,” John said, and then suddenly Eridan had thrown his arms around John’s shoulders and was hugging him, hard.

“And you fuckin’ be careful. I love you.”

Oh. “I love you, too.”

Sollux was staring blankly up at them when they tore away from each other, and then Eridan stooped down to bodily lift Sollux in his arms – Sollux made an angry noise at this, which reminded John again of Karkat, and if his heart kept up this pace he was going to die tonight. Eridan left, cradling Sollux, and Bec pushed his nose into the back of John’s knee.

“We need to find Dave and Aradia, okay?” John said, scruffing the top of the dog’s head. Bec jumped twice from side to side and then lifted his massive head to snort the air hungrily, tongue lolling, before galloping off.

“Good luck, John,” Equius said, and John faltered. Equius had never really spoken to him before.

“Uh, thanks! Listen, stay safe.”

“Of course.”

And then he was off after Bec, following all of the dog’s swishing tails into the night. As he ran he adjusted his scarf and hood again, wary of strangers leaping on him. Bec led him past the street he’d found Vriska on earlier, and John felt oddly vindicated to see the corpse of the man who he presumed had thrown the bomb at the warehouse; the one he’d cornered, earlier. Alarmingly, splashed under the lamp glare was a pool of smeared cerulean blood; markers of a struggle and no sign of Vriska. They didn’t have time to stop.

John had no concept of how much time had passed, but by the time they’d made it back to the part of town that had been up in furious flames before, most of the blaze had died down to a quiet ember or nothing at all. People were milling around but not in urgency: nursing their wounds, working their weary way to the Living Room, and, most hearteningly, reuniting with their loved ones. By now, John felt mostly empty. Tavros was dead, Karkat was probably awake and wondering where the hell he had gone – Sollux, Kanaya and now Vriska too were injured; Dave and Aradia, missing.

But not for long. A few moments’ more running and they had broken free of the crowd, two alleyways later and suddenly he spotted the pair of them. And more.

Aradia lay in the foetal position in the middle of the road, rust-red soaking straight through what looked like her nightdress. Her hair was everywhere and her arms were radiant with burns, and slicked with soot. Dave was on his knees in front of her, back to her, holding himself up with one shaking arm as he faced down two men who were both holding guns pointing at him and Dave had nothing – but he had the best backup in the world.

“First the girl, and now you,” the gun-wielding stranger called out, and before John even knew what he was doing, before he could process what it meant to kill a man, he’d drawn his gun and fired a shot through the guy’s skull. As he crumpled uselessly to the ground, his friend turned to run but not fast enough and he fell too from a shot in the back of the head. John sprinted over to Dave and Aradia, and he didn’t feel connected to the situation at all, he didn’t really feel anything.

“You need to get to the Living Room,” John said, breathless, and Dave stared up at him with huge bloody eyes; he’d lost his glasses, he was bleeding massively from a head wound that slicked his yellow-silk hair into scarlet flicks.

“Come on,” John insisted. There was no way he was losing Dave, of all people, and suddenly out of all the exhaustion came a flare of driving anger, and the will to struggle on.

He couldn’t carry both of them, but Bec was a good dog – Dave ended up sitting on Bec’s back, one hand pressed to his cracked skull, the other tangled in the fur over Bec’s shoulderblades. John cradled Aradia in his arms. She’d been shot in the stomach and she was unconscious, probably near death by now for the crimson that was spurting out of her. They’d already lost Tavros.

Dave wasn’t even in the shape to have a conversation with him, or tell him what had happened – Bec couldn’t run with Dave on top of him so badly injured so they went on at a quick stride, joining the throngs of people wearily padding over to the Living Room. Trolls running in the opposite direction with firehoses and buckets of water heartened the crowd, but it was getting increasingly difficult to force a smile out of John.

Soon they had all piled into the bar. The most severely wounded – Aradia, Dave and Sollux amongst them – were laid out on the floor, while others sat on tables. The situation was so awful that even those who needed bandaging themselves were dealing out first aid. Gamzee and Eridan had taken to Sollux, who John gathered had broken ribs, and behind him, Feferi and Rose were tending to Aradia. He and Terezi knelt one either side of Dave; Terezi bandaged his head as John wiped clean a hole where a bullet had clipped his shoulder. John had cast aside his scarf now and the cooler air was some small relief amongst the mess.

“How’s she doing?” John said over his shoulder to Rose, as he balled gauze into Dave’s wound.

“Still bleeding. Still alive. She’s lucky,” Feferi said, sighing over Aradia’s unconscious body.

“What’s it like out there?” Eridan said, swabbing gauze over the deep gashes on Sollux’s sides.

“The fires are under control. Not completely out, but mostly,” John said, finally able to staunch the flow of blood from Dave’s shoulder. He was starting to look kind of stupid, with yellow tufts sticking out from the gaps in his head bandage. “There are only a few humans still around.”

“No shit, did you see Vris? She killed at least two dozen last I saw her.”

John forced out a laugh rather than admit that the last he’d seen of her was her blood splattered all over the pavement. He had sent Bec off to look for her, just in case, and he knew there was no use worrying but he did all the same as he wound a bandage tight under Dave’s arm and around his shoulder.

All of a sudden the door flew open as if blasted by a wayward wind; it crashed so hard into the wall adjacent that dust poured down from the cracks in the ceiling. There, framed in the dim-lit doorway, cut with amber lantern light, stood Vriska Serket, and John had never seen her looking so awful. She shook, leaning hard against the doorframe, her chest heaving with the effort of standing upright at all; in one arm she held something, some piece of scrap that after a moment John realised had been her brass arm, and one of her jacket sleeves had been torn off, revealing a bare and bloody socket where her mechanical limb had once been attached. Her glasses were gone, and enormous tears in her shirt revealed swathes of cerulean blood, splattered across pallid grey skin and smeared across her collarbones, up her neck, to where it rained down, some sick waterfall, from her left eyesocket, where there was the second worst wound John had ever seen – her skin had been fully seared off and was charred at the edges, charcoal-black, and there was no familiar pop of lantern-glare yellow: her eye had been gouged out.

“The fuck are you staring at?” she gravelled, and lurched into the room, brass arm scoring a bloody trail across the carpet behind her.

“Vriska!” Feferi cried, and with a nod from Rose she flitted across the room to snatch Vriska’s arm away from her, and lead her to a spare spot on the floor, where she was forced – unhappily – to sit down.

“I’m fine, it doesn’t even hurt – get away from me with that damned bandage – I do not need help!”

“Shut up,” Feferi snapped, setting down a pile of medical equipment. John knotted Dave’s bandage as, furiously, Vriska shrugged off her jacket and peeled off her tattered shirt so that Feferi could bandage across her chest and over the gaping hole in her arm.

As she did, Vriska said, “Where the hell is Tavros? Somebody better tell him he needs to put my arm back in.”

“Where _is_ Tavros?” Feferi said. “Sollux, wasn’t he with you?”

“Tavros is dead,” Eridan said, and the room fell hush. John felt his face burning. “He got too badly hurt when the warehouse blew up.”

“Shit,” Vriska hissed, her one good bugging. “Tavros – really?”

“Yeah,” Eridan said, not tearing his eyes away from Sollux.

Business in the room continued; once the serious were tended to, those with minor wounds were seen by those who could still stand. The atmosphere had grown darker, more sullen, again, as the deaths were tallied. Tavros’ was the only name John recognised but the list was heart-wrenching all the same. In about an hour’s time, when almost all of the injured had been treated, John found himself sitting at the bar, alone, head in his hands.

Eridan approached him, took a seat beside him.

“How are you doin’?”

“I don’t know,” John replied, truthfully. “It’s been a long day. And it all happened so fast.”

“Karkat’s waitin’ on you, huh?”

“I hope so.”

“You go home, soon. Once Nepeta and Equius show up. Once everything’s under control,” Eridan said. “Go an’ make sure he knows you love him, alright?”

John hesitated, before nodding.

“’Cause one a you two could get blown up tomorrow.”

“Yeah. Yeah, I know,” John said, running a hand through his hair.

“It ain’t your fault,” Eridan said. “You did what any a us woulda done. The best thing you could.”

“Thanks, Eridan.”

Eridan laid a hand on his shoulder, forced him to meet his eyes.

“Thank _you_ , John. Without you runnin’ around who knows how much worse it coulda been,” Eridan said, and John managed a smile for him, for a moment.

“Hey, how is Sollux?”

“Ah, he’s hurt, but he’s gripin’ about it, so it can’t be that bad,” Eridan laughed, but John didn’t miss the brief flicker of concern in his eyes. He knew only too well what it was like to see a loved one hurt.

Then, the door opened again, and in staggered an exhausted Nepeta, propped up by a sweating Equius.

“The fires are out!” Nepeta exclaimed, throwing an arm in the air in shattered triumph.

“Oh, what a relief,” Rose said, from where she now sat, cross-legged on the floor beside Kanaya, who was heavily bandaged but still smiling.

“What about the rest of those human bastards?” Vriska needled. “Whoops, sorry, John.”

This was followed by laughter, and Equius adjusted his cracked shades before replying, “It would seem that we have dispatched them all.”

“Fantastic. Okay, listen up!” Feferi said, springing to her feet beside Vriska, who sat on the floor next to her looking menacing even at knee height. “It’s probably best if we all stay here for a few hours to make sure that everything’s safe before we leave. If you’re uninjured, please report to Eridan, who will be sending out search parties.”

“Get outta here, John. Make sure Karkat doesn’t do anything stupid,” Eridan said, and John nodded, curled his scarf around his face again, and took his leave quietly.

* * *

After half an hour’s walk home, John found himself standing in the dim-lit doorway of his apartment. Karkat was still in bed. Karkat was still asleep, amazingly. He hadn’t even read the note that John had left for him. He locked the door behind him and glanced at the clock to find that it was nearly four in the morning – mercifully, he had no shifts today. He needed the sleep. He tugged down his hood, and peeled his scarf away from his sweaty, soot-stained face, for the last time.

The sound of him closing the door had woken Karkat, who sat up in bed, rubbing his eyes with the back of a hand – his bandaged hand, and his black eye, which left him hissing in confused pain.

“Slow down,” John said. “You’re hurt.”

“Where the hell have you been?” Karkat rasped, his voice bleary and thick with sleep. “What’s goin’ on? Turn the damn light on.”

John turned the damn light on, which flooded the room with a small measure of dull lantern’s buzz. This cast John into soft relief, but enough to widen Karkat’s eyes.

“Holy shit – what happened?” Karkat said, voice cracking to a whisper as he stared across at John, eyes blaring like lamps. And then he shifted under the covers, flung his legs out of bed.

“You’re hurt,” John said. “Don’t.”

“It’s fine, I’m fine,” Karkat mumbled, easing himself out of bed to pad over to the bathroom door. “C’mon, you’re filthy.”

Exhausted, defeated, John trailed after Karkat into the bathroom and perched on the edge of the tub as Karkat started the bath running. A stream of hot water kicked up wisps of steam as it burbled against porcelain.

“Fire?” Karkat said, and John could only nod. They were both just too tired; Karkat couldn’t, or didn’t dare, ask if anyone had died, or what had been destroyed, he could only stand there with his arms wrapped around his own waist, staring blankly at the inch of water, cut with cloudy swirls, in the hollow of the bath. John took off his glasses, left them folded on the counter. He then started tugging at the zipper of his hoodie, but after a moment his hands were replaced by Karkat’s, shaking and pale, and Karkat couldn’t meet his eyes even as he slowly unzipped his jacket and then let John shrug it off, and tossed it aside, and they both saw that the soot and dirt had permeated to colour his bare forearms. Karkat’s fingers curled around the hem of John’s shirt and John let him pull it up and over his head, and it too was balled up and flung down against the tiles, and then Karkat’s hands were over the clammy skin of his ribs, burning hot against wet ice, and it was the sweetest touch he’d had in what seemed like an eternity and he let out a groan that dissolved into a mumble as Karkat kissed his forehead, and whimpered.

“What’s up?” John mumbled, and Karkat touched their foreheads together, fingers still pressed against John’s sides, cupping his comforting firmness.

“You came back alive,” Karkat said, “You. John. Thank you.”

“I wasn’t gonna leave you here alone,” John said, shrugging, and Karkat kissed him again, now on the mouth, and John melted on the spot. His every muscle screamed in pain but the knots eased out and he exhaled slow through his nose as their lips moved and tongues curled, and Karkat sucked on his lower lip, frowning through the taste of soot and sweat and blood, and then there were hands playing the button of his jeans.

“Behave,” John mumbled, and Karkat grinned, weary but wicked, as their lips parted.

“You’re taking a bath, dumbass,” Karkat said, undoing the button and the zipper, and John peeled the jeans away from his sticky, smoke-tainted skin, and tugged off his socks, sitting there on the bath’s edge in front of his matesprit, both of them stripped down only to their underwear.

“We look fucking awful,” Karkat said, glancing down at his own battered stitched-together skin, and then at every spot where a scarlet wound or purpling bruise had popped up against the coal-black sheen over John’s skin.

“Well, it’s been a bad week,” John said, and Karkat snorted.

“Now that’s what I’d call a fucking understatement,” he said, as he turned the taps to let a stream of cooler water pour into the tub.

“Are you gonna bathe me?”

“That is the plan.”

“I love you,” John said, rubbing one eye with the back of his less sooty hand.

“I love you too,” Karkat rasped, breathily, like this had taken him off guard. “Obviously.”

Karkat turned the tap again, and the room fell silent, and John cast aside his underwear before clambering awkwardly into the bathtub on his aching limbs. The dirt started leeching from his skin immediately, colouring the water grey as he eased himself slowly into the water. It was warm, sweet, blissful relief for every inch of his aching body.

“How’s that? Warm enough?” Karkat said, dunking a hand into the water to make sure.

“Yeah,” was all John could manage, tilting back his head to stretch out his spine as Karkat ran his hands up his sides to loosen what little dirt had seeped all the way through his clothes. “I’m disgusting. Sorry.”

“I really couldn’t give less of a shit,” Karkat murmured, rubbing wet fingertips into the supple skin over John’s collarbones, easing away the ash. He trailed his hands across over John’s shoulders, massaging hard the aching muscle and shifting the dirt before washing down his arms, which were thickly coloured. John could’ve fallen asleep, right there and then; but then he would’ve missed Karkat’s heavy-lidded eyes staring him down, he would’ve missed lying naked and prone and wet under the hands of his lover, and that would’ve been inexcusable.

“Your hands are cut.”

“Not deep. It doesn’t hurt.”

Karkat lifted them out of the water and kissed each wound, all the same.

“You’re hurt worse than I am, why are you –”

“You’re always looking after me,” Karkat said, now gently rinsing the cut on John’s cheek.

“You don’t owe me anything.”

“I know.”

Karkat kissed him on his wet knee, and John conceded, and let Karkat tilt his head carefully back in the water to wet his hair.

“You wanna wash my hair?” John smirked, and Karkat nodded, just a little over-earnestly, before soaping up his damp mess of flicks and rubbing hard into his scalp. His little nails were a tiny bit too sharp, but John wasn’t in the mood to complain, because Karkat was looking at him like he was made out of diamonds.

“Rinse,” Karkat commanded and, grinning, John leaned his head back in the water, filling his ears with water that swallowed all outside sound. He let his eyes slide shut as Karkat leaned over him, running fingers through his hair to ease out the last suds.

And then John sat up again, sighing, content. Looking at himself now, it was almost like nothing had happened: he was a bit bruised and his hands were cut up but besides that, it could’ve been any other night.

“You wanna go back to bed?” John said.

“With you? Sure.”

“You’ve been asleep all this time.”

“What’s your point, Egbert?” Karkat said, pulling the plug out of the bath. John laughed, picked himself up, and padded across the room to grab a towel. He scruffed his hair, first, and then his hands were replaced by Karkat’s, who left him tousle-haired but towel-dried.

“Bed,” was all John said, then, and Karkat nodded, taking him by the hand to lead him back into the bedroom, flicking off the bathroom and bedroom lights so that they were left lit only by a rectangle of distant lamplight that bled in through the bedroom window.

Karkat shuffled under the covers first and John slid in to join him, and the bed wasn’t big enough for two of them – Karkat was small, but John was huge, but it was comfortable enough. They lay facing eachother, chest-to-chest, and John lay one warm arm across Karkat’s waist. Karkat nestled into the crook of John’s neck.

“Tell me what happened today,” Karkat said, and John didn’t want to keep secrets.

“Some humans set the Lower City on fire,” he replied. “I don’t know why, or who, or anything.”

“Did anyone get hurt?”

“A lot of people did.”

“Did anyone die?”

John faltered for a second – long enough for Karkat to know that the answer was yes.

“What happened?” Karkat said. “John. _What happened?_ ”

“Someone threw a bomb at Vriska’s warehouse. There were four people inside, and… only three got out,” John said, screwing his eyes shut. “Someone was hurt. Too badly hurt. When I found them. So I had to. Yeah.”

“Who died? Do you know them?” Karkat whispered, but even his hushed tone couldn’t hide the urgency in his voice, the desperation.

“Yeah, uh. It was Tavros.”

“No,” Karkat said, and then curled into a tighter ball, and then shook, and took a breath that he couldn’t keep steady, and he whimpered, gasped.

“I know,” John said, stroking the hair at the back of Karkat’s head, cupping his broken body a bit closer. Karkat was shaking his head, John suddenly noticed, so John peeled away an inch to look him in the eye.

“John,” Karkat croaked, tears pouring down his face in rivulets, streaming from his cheekbones. “John, the package I was meant to deliver.”

“What about it?” John said, doing his best to not shatter into a million pieces as he threaded his fingers through Karkat’s hair.

“It was – only Tavros knows how –”

He couldn’t finish his sentence before he collapsed against John’s chest and muffled his furious howl of self-disgust into his matesprit. John could feel every ounce of tension in Karkat’s arms as they curled around himself, he saw the way Karkat’s fingers splayed like he wanted to dig his nails into his skin and rip it from his bones, and John sat up, pulled Karkat up, too, and put his arms around him: one around his shoulders, the other around his waist, to stop him before he could.

“I,” Karkat struggled, clearly not able to grasp the words to express how much he despised himself, “I. I.”

“Tell me,” was all John could think to say, pressing his hands firm and hard against Karkat’s skin, holding him together.

“I. I. Ruined. _Everything._ ”

“It’s okay,” John said, resting his chin on the top of Karkat’s head. “It’s really okay.”

Karkat had balled the covers in his fists and was crying harder than John thought possible; his chest was quivering between heaves as all his muscles clamped down hard to expel the air from his lungs, he was choking on his breaths and whimpering and really, _really_ sobbing, moaning like he couldn’t even piece words around why it hurt so badly, mumbling curses with what little breath he could control. Three breaths came out in a juddering line, and Karkat tried to pull away from him.

“Stay,” John said, pressing him back.

“Let me go,” Karkat whimpered, but he slumped back against the firm lines of John’s body.

“What happened to Tavros is not your fault, okay,” John said. “It’s not your fault that you couldn’t deliver the package, either.”

“I’m pathetic, I’m –”

“You were unlucky, and that is all.”

“We’re all going to die.”

“We are all going to be fine,” John corrected him, and then cupped his cheeks with both hands and tilted his wet little face up. He was a mess; his eyes were puffy and red-ringed, reduced to yellow lines like slitted lamps, his eyelashes were clumping together, his lips were wet and chapped and sore and he gritted his teeth as John looked him over. “One person can’t ruin everything, Karkat. That is just not how the world works.”

“You’d be surprised how much I can fuck up!”

“You haven’t fucked up anything,” John insisted, with such finality in his voice that Karkat seemed to concede, at least for now. “You haven’t even done anything wrong. You are trying just as hard as the rest of us.”

Karkat took a deep breath in, and let it out in a slow shudder.

“Yeah,” he eventually said, and John gave a sigh of relief. “I just…”

“You just… don’t like yourself at all, do you?”

Karkat blinked at him, eyes flashing like a cat’s, and then said, “No, not really.”

“I think,” John said, and then his throat burned. It took him a second for him to realise that he was starting to tear up – it had been years nearly since the last time he’d cried, but here he was. “I think you’re incredible. I fell in love with you so quickly I barely even knew what was happening, Karkat, you completely changed my life. What would I do without you?”

Karkat laughed, and then said, “You’d be happy.”

“Don’t say that,” John said, and he found himself grinning too, in abject fucking misery, as a first tear dripped down his face. Oh, god. “Don’t.” His throat had completely closed up. “You don’t understand –”

He couldn’t say any more. Everything was blurry.

“I love you, Egbert,” Karkat said. “There were times I wish I didn’t. But it’s getting ever more obvious that – that I need you.”

John shook his head. “No, Karkat, god, _I_ need _you_ ,” he choked, and screwed his eyes shut as the floodgates really opened and he pressed his lips together but the next thing he knew Karkat’s mouth was on him. They kissed in a way that was fundamentally desperate, as though it’d finally just clicked that with every tick of the clock they were approaching a time when they’d be dust, bones under the ground, a whisper in someone’s memory, ghosts in places that they’d once loved, and this bed would break someday, and this building would fall down, and eventually even if it all came to nothing and their heads split open to paint the pavements, they would still have today. They would still have right now: this was all real, Karkat’s weight, suddenly on top of him, the way his spine curved and his body moved, the scent of him, earthy and cut with warmth, how his fingers weaved into John’s hair, the taste of his bloody lips, and the way that John loved him more than he would ever love anything again, the fact that his foolish heart only kept beating to protect this poor broken man, and the feel of hot skin under his palms, teeth on his lips, and a frantic heart crashing against his. This was what they had, this love that had started so small. This was their legacy.

Karkat whispered a quiet request in his ear.

“I can do that,” John murmured in response, and he rolled over to have Karkat splayed out underneath of him.

This night together was not like their first: that had been urgent, frantic, desperate. This was slow and necessarily gentle, and quiet. Outside the city had yet to wake up, and the room was cold, but with John on top of him, Karkat couldn’t have noticed.

Karkat had all these scars, ladders up his thighs. Tonight John took the time to kiss every one of them.

“You are beautiful,” he said, at one point, as Karkat lay shaking and beaded with sweat underneath him. That was when Karkat started to cry, again, and when John asked him what was wrong, he couldn’t say. He didn’t know.

“I feel so broken, John,” he said. “And I don’t know if you can –”

“I can fix anything.”

He breathed.

“I will fix this.”


	21. I Can't Take This Any More

**Notes for the Chapter:**

>  **Trigger warnings:** Discussion of loss, murder  & guns.

John woke to the comfort of a familiar weight on his mattress, and the sound of springs creaking. In his slumber, Karkat rolled over, snuffling something under his breath, some half-mumble. John’s head was too full of sleepy fog for him to decipher it. Of course Karkat talked in his sleep. As if he would ever actually turn off, John thought with a wry little crinkle of his shut eyes. So long as he kept his eyes closed, he didn’t have to face the room, and for as long as he didn’t have to face the room, he could pretend that everything was fine. And so he did, stretching out his legs from ten pointed toes within a warm cocoon of shared heat, under the bulk of thick blankets. One long flat plane of his body touched Karkat, and all John could sense of him was burning hot skin, and the rustle and purr of hushed breaths.

And then he opened his eyes, because the world wasn’t just going to go away. It came to him first as a crack of muted golden light, and then a field of coalescing, shifting shapes, in low chocolate hues, subdued, amber and tan. They were alone in the room and somebody had turned the colours down, the volume, and it didn’t even smell of ash at all, and only his back hurt – but when he thought about it, his palms started to sting, too, and then an empty place in his chest started to cane because he’d shot Tavros in the head and his field of vision started bleeding honey at the edges. He took one sharp breath, through his nose, and turned his head to look at sleeping Karkat.

All the pain, the terror, the tragedy, it still didn’t make any sense, but Karkat was the only drug that ever seemed to work. He was facing away, so that John imagined the front of him would have caught all the custardy golden light oozing from the windowpane opposite. From this angle, though, John could see enough. He was singularly the most beautiful thing in this god damned city: that was a truth so profound that John couldn’t imagine anyone ever doubting it. His fluffy crow-black hair was slicked with crusted blood and whipped into a frenzy, but what did it matter: the nape of his neck, at his hairline, had flushed lush red, along with the skin over the nubs of his shoulder bones; his shoulder blades, broad flat horizontals, sloped down into the slightest of indents, his spine, that swept and disappeared underneath the blanket drawn up to his waist. And he was graphite-grey and cat-fur-soft. He was peppered and pock-marked with bruises, too, crimson and scarlet and upsettingly, unnecessarily bright; he was wound with bandages and somewhere marked with stitches in John’s own hand, but that was fine, because all wounds heal, eventually.

John never really saw anything beautiful in himself but there was something, here, something in the way that his own bronze skin, striped with scars he’d picked up in defence of this perfect man and their desperate love, cut contrast against charcoal-grey. And they both looked so dark against the white of the blanket, like their love was meant to live in the shadows, a quiet and private thing, like John was supposed to build walls up for the both of them and lock the door. One day, one day.

Just then, Karkat stirred, and John’s eyes flicked for a second at the clock on the bedside table – eight in the morning. They’d only been asleep for a matter of hours. His attention was drawn back to Karkat almost immediately as his shoulder started to shake, and John could almost hear the sound of teeth gritting together as Karkat curled up, chin tucking against his chest, drawing his knees in, sluggish and yet wracked with tension that was painful to watch. His breaths were coming hissed in between teeth, slow, but hard.

“Karkat.”

A whimper, a frantic note, like nothing John ever wanted to hear again.

“Karkat, c’mon.”

He laid one big hand on Karkat’s shoulder and eased him over, softly, softly. Onto his back, where Karkat lay, still clasping his knees close to his chest, tears leaking out of eyes that were screwed shut. John’s hand moved, to cup Karkat’s kneecap, and gently draw out the line of Karkat’s leg, stretching him out, there was no need to lie like that, so screwed up.

“It’s alright,” John kept saying, because really, they were two small people in a small room, alone with the dust and the sheets, and for now they were safe. “Relax.”

Karkat dug his fingernails out of his biceps, leaving angry red welts, and uncurled his arms from where they were folded around his chest. He laid his hands on his belly that jumped with every breath he caught trying not to sob, but it was useless.

“I know it’s awful,” John said, propping himself up on his elbow, now, and using his free hand to trace lines on Karkat’s chest. He started burning red. “Talk to me, if you want. Open your eyes.”

And he did open his eyes, and they flashed topaz and ruby in a way that John knew intimately and would never be able to recover from. Tears glossed for a moment before they tumbled down, streaking the sides of his face, and oh god, John had never thought it was going to hurt this bad, and then when he thought about it for a second he realised he would’ve done it all anyway. There was no love like Karkat’s.

“Tavros is dead,” Karkat croaked, and then half-gagged on a sob, and almost screwed his eyes shut again, lip curling.

“He is. I am so sorry,” John said, and Karkat looked up at him, then, looked him in the eye.

“It’s not your fault,” he rasped out, and then sniffed. “You couldn’t – there wasn’t – oh my fucking _god_ –”

He rolled over, beyond consolation, and buried his wet face into John’s chest; John settled down onto the mattress and wrapped one arm and one leg around his matesprit, rubbing soothing circles into the small of his back with one palm. Karkat’s fingers had curled around each of his shoulders, but he was holding John like he never held himself: softly. Even as he sobbed.

“I’m scared,” Karkat whispered, and then went on, more forcefully: “It’s not safe anymore, anywhere, we’re running out of options, there’s nowhere to hide, I – I – I –”

“Eridan wants you to move in with him. The fire didn’t get to his part of town, and you should be safer there,” John said. “You won’t be so lonely.”

“Like they’re gonna want me around,” Karkat choked, and John squeezed him a little tighter. “I fucked up, I fucked up, and now Tavros is fucking dead and we’re all going to hell.”

“Nobody blames you for anything, Karkat, I swear. Everyone was asking for you, everyone was worried, when I was there last night. They… they love you. They want to see you.”

Karkat didn’t say anything.

“And besides,” John said, and paused to kiss the top of Karkat’s head. “You can’t stay here forever, little man.”

“I am not little,” Karkat snapped back immediately, and John grinned into his bloody hair. “I’ll go to Eridan’s. But, Egbert, you have to promise me you’re gonna… I don’t even fucking know, just, please, fucking do something about this. Anything. I’m desperate.”

“I am gonna do everything I can,” John said, and then pushed Karkat away a couple of inches, to look him in the eyes. “Just don’t give up, okay? Don’t ever give up thinking that things are gonna get better. Because they will.”

“I know,” Karkat said, huskily. “I just don’t know if I’m gonna be alive to see it, you know?”

His voice cracked and fresh tears started welling up, and John ached.

“Just… just stay out of trouble, alright, just do your best to hide, and keep your head down,” John said, suddenly serious, and grave. “They need you safe.”

He stopped, for a second, and chewed his lower lip.

“And I, uh. I am completely in love with you. You know? So, yeah.”

“Yeah, I know,” Karkat said, and then pressed his lips to John’s and kissed him gently, careful with his own split lip and bruised nose, but careful with John, too, winding an arm around John’s neck so softly and sending a thrill down his spine that embarrassingly – painfully – had John twitching at the hips and murmuring half a sound of pleasure into Karkat’s open mouth, and god, it was so warm, and Karkat was so real, and firm, but yielding, his fingernails playing the nape of John’s neck, the tip of his tongue touching against John’s lower lip, and suddenly the way his waist felt under the flat of John’s palm, and the way his teeth rolled the skin of John’s neck, and how his tongue slid across skin that was starting to prickle with sweat, and, oh god… oh, god.

“Kar— K— Karkat, cut it out,” John struggled to spit out, and Karkat stopped instantly, pressing his forehead against John’s chest to hide his face. John managed to catch his breath again, and he shook, and then he felt his cheeks run red with shame. “I have to go to work.”

“Oh,” Karkat said, and then sank back onto his pillow, looking up at John with eyes empty of accusation or frustration, even though guilt had already started to gnaw at John’s insides. “Can’t you come with me? To Eridan’s?” he said, but even as he said it he sounded defeated.

“I’m sorry, I can’t, not in uniform,” John spat out, not meeting Karkat’s eyes before he kicked off the covers and turned out of bed. “I don’t –”

“How am I supposed to get home?” Karkat said to John’s back. “It’s not safe to use the underground routes any more, right? 

“No, it’s not,” John said, crossing the room to fumble through his wardrobe, hunting out clean clothes. “Bundle up, cover your face. And your hands. And take one of my guns, I have spares –”

He grabbed one and set it on the bedside table with a click. “Do you remember that map I gave you guys? There are routes that are not being patrolled this morning.”

“Yeah, I remember. Fuck, I hate your kind,” Karkat said, his voice tangling in a snarl towards the end. “I’ll take the damn gun.”

“Right. I know, I’m sorry. I want to take you back myself, okay? But I have to go to work or they’ll get suspicious.” He added as an afterthought, “If they aren’t already.”

“Yeah, well. Should’ve thought about that before you started wanting troll ass,” Karkat huffed, and John chose to staunchly ignore the hurt in his voice. 

“I don’t just want your ass. Karkat, don’t say stuff like that.”

“Whatever. Why can’t we just have a normal life?”

“Please don’t start crying again,” John pleaded, half-into his jacket. “Because I have to go and I already hate myself for this. I know it’s not right.”

“Yeah, okay,” Karkat said lowly, pushing the heels of his hands into his eyes. “I love you so much, you… you butt.”

John sank to his knees on the mattress, crawled over to Karkat, sank his face into those dark, bloody curls. “I love you too,” he said lowly, loosely cradling Karkat around the shoulders, pulling him against his chest. “We can have a normal life, just… not soon.”

“Right,” Karkat said, and John could feel a little tug and pull as Karkat started fastening the buttons of his jacket. His fingers ran the edges of crisp dark wool. “Stay safe. I need you to. I don’t care what it takes. Don’t die.”

“I told you, I’m not gonna die.”

“Not ever?”

John didn’t falter. “Not soon.”

“I guess that’s good enough,” Karkat said, and then he kissed John hard, on the mouth, pulling him close by his lapels. He was mumbling half-sounds into John’s hot lips, and John was powerless and full of warmth. 

They pulled apart.

“You need to be gone, soon,” John said urgently.

“I will be.”

“Okay. Good,” John said, and then stood, pulled on his boots, holstered his guns, and left the warm golden light of his room for the sterility of the corridor outside, the cold, grim emptiness, and a city full of people that would rip him to shreds if only they knew.

* * *

“What’s wrong with it?”

Jane called up to him from some fifteen feet below: John was aerial, legs wrapped around the post of a greatlamp in the Bazaar, which now was sputtering and flickering in his face. John groped for a key slung around his neck before thrusting it into a lock at the joint of the glass panels, and one swung open to reveal a glowing bulb. It held an amber liquid that blazed white hot at its surface and puddled, heated from within by the supposedly immortal wick – but the light was dying and the solution congealing and bubbling. There were several brands of greatlamp in the city, but they still hadn’t managed to perfect any that wouldn’t ever need tending.

“I’m not sure,” John called back, peering at it. 

“Can you unscrew it?”

It looked hot. John tried it with the side of one index finger and found that the rounded glass surface was surprisingly cool. There was no way of turning it off – the reaction was powered from a powdered catalyst within the mixture, so it wouldn’t stop until it died. It seemed about to, but the bulb was still blisteringly warm about its base, where it was screwed in. He groped in his pocket for a glove, into which he thrust his right hand. Then he gripped the base of the bulb and turned it – the screw mechanism ground horribly, like rusted cogs, but eventually the bulb popped out.

Then, quite suddenly, it exploded in his hand – a yellow-hot burst of light and pain, an instinctive jerk backwards and John was airborne and falling.

After what felt like half a second he was lying on top of Jane. His neck felt as though someone had wrung it out.

“Ouch—! John? You hit your head.”

* * *

Jane helped him all the way back to headquarters, John’s arm slung over her neck, and limping. She’d also wiped the worst of the burns on John’s face clean with a handkerchief, very gently. After seeing a medic, John was discharged for the rest of the day with mild concussion. The pain didn’t sting nearly as much as the embarrassment of being injured during routine duties – no one knew, of course, how long he’d been awake for the night before, or the hell he’d been through yesterday.

Standing outside the medical bay, John checked his watch. It was just after one p.m., and he had to decide what to do. By now, Karkat would have likely made it to Eridan’s safely. He should visit Jade, he thought – and then remembered how Tavros’ death hung over him, and he felt his insides squirm uncomfortably. She deserved to hear from someone who loved her, someone who had been there… someone who was responsible, in part. He wondered, briefly, if he felt guilty. There was nothing to be done. He’d done the humane thing. Right?

His frustrations almost got the better of him, and he thought of Karkat, and wondered what perils his lover might be facing. Perhaps he’d been attacked. But he had a gun.

John ran his fingers through his hair. He had to see Jade.

* * *

“Something awful happened, didn’t it?” Jade said.

She certainly didn’t need clairvoyance to know that as fact – it was plain to see. John had caught sight of himself in a silvery shard Jade kept as a mirror; he had never looked so haggard, so old and tired, so empty inside. This day was passing in grey and black vignettes; empty moments, situations he had broken, passing in drips. He thought his hands might still be covered in sticky amber – they weren’t. Just white-knuckled. The visions were not bearable. He felt nothing and everything all at once.

“Yes,” John said, simply. His teeth hurt, his temples throbbed. 

“I thought I saw the smoke,” Jade said. “Last night. It was horrible. It was… it was huge. It was just… it was so horrible. And the screaming. I didn’t know what to do. I couldn’t do anything.”

The colour in her eyes had gone out, too, John noticed. How could he tell her? How could he even explain?

“It was arson. Obviously. When I got there, there were humans all over,” John said. He felt very detached, not like he was rubbing salt into an open wound. Maybe it was his head injury. Maybe it was something else. Maybe he was ill. “Someone bombed Vriska’s warehouse. And… Tavros was inside.”

Jade didn’t say anything. Sitting beside John on her little cot, she drew her knees up to her chest, leaning in so that her long, long hair shielded her face. She might’ve been crying, John didn’t know.

“I went in, to find him. But he – he was really hurt,” John said, censoring himself. “He asked me to shoot him, so I did. Jade, I’m so sorry.”

Finally, he cracked. He’d had to shoot his friend in the head and it was so, so awful, and everyone he loved was in mortal danger, and he had tried to help them, and he had been too late. Jade didn’t have anything to add, she must’ve noticed the shift in his demeanour, and they sat there, huddled together, for a while. After some time, she fell asleep on his shoulder.

When she woke, she said, “Thank you for coming, John.”

* * *

Lost, dazed and confused, John had wandered down to the archives. He had become tired, so very, very tired, of viewing his life as though through a telescope. He felt dazed, like a moth too many times flown into glass, looking for the moon. Everything was too bright – ironic in a world lit only by lampwick. He had been searching for something to read, some kind of solace – something to remind him of Karkat, who loved such things, who he could not face right now, for reasons wholly his own, wholly foolish, probably. But who was here to judge him? He sat alone in the stale quiet of the Lamplighter archives, a small yet labyrinthine basement delineated by bookshelves and glowing with reddish lantern light, humming with very quiet, very old secrets.

There were no real books here, just boring things such as gun licenses granted, court cases and old statutes. There was nothing to learn, just the micro-dramas and day-to-day of months past. Still, that was comforting in its own way, he thought, as he pored over old murder records. It was macabre, of course, but a few were compelling – the accidents, witness statements from the obviously affected, the unsolved mysteries, these stories larger than, and satellites of, his own world. As he read on, a narrative unwound. One person, identified only by initials, came up over and over again in vigilante and revenge killings, tied to smuggling, the illegal engineering black market, and – thrillingly – trolls. Perhaps John was living in their footsteps now, he thought wryly – a thought made rather unsettling by the fact that they shared initials: J.E.. 

Something swelled in his memory. John sat back in his hard-backed chair, which protested at the weight. He rubbed his temples to quell the ache, stared up at the stone ceiling, watching the spiders scuttle and cobwebs flutter in the hot updraft of candle flame. It was a bizarre coincidence. He felt as though he recognised the initials for some reason, but was it just because they were his own? Was he just reading too much into this, thought processes sent haywire by recent events? He thought about the J, specifically, for a few moments, casting his floundering mind far back – there was something back there, he was so sure, but he wasn’t sure why it mattered, or why it compelled him so much. 

When the memory came back, it nearly made him sick as it unfolded. It had been so deeply buried underneath layer upon layer of hell that dragging it back sent everything writhing. Some time ago - who knew how long, it could’ve been months – John had been shot. The scar still gave him pain from time to time, burning when he stretched, a hot halo radiating from his side. He had been out of uniform in the Lower City, and he had been seen, and attacked, and then a great drama had unfurled, because he lacked judgment, because he was too in love. He grimaced: Karkat had kissed Aradia, and it had hurt him for reasons he didn’t want to admit at the time, and his assailant had escaped, but for some reason that hadn’t affected him as much as Karkat’s infidelity, which incidentally wasn’t even a real infidelity; Karkat owed him nothing, ever. 

God, he had been an irrational jerk. He almost laughed, forgetting the point of his reverie for a moment. Vriska had saved the day, because she was incredible, honestly operating on a higher level of thinking than he would probably ever be able to. He ought to tell her that, he realised.

Later, John had attacked a flying cat, which was the kind of unbelievable thing that just went down in his life. He’d wrested a note from under its collar, which was addressed to Vriska, and signed J. What were the odds it was the same person, he wondered? Maybe there were other rogue mercenaries named J-something.

All of this gave him a thrill that made him feel he should investigate further. He very briefly felt alive. Was it selfish to want to do something for himself, something private?

He didn’t have the time to consider this for very long, because suddenly, the door to the archives creaked open then slammed shut. The echo was swallowed by the winding alleyways of bookcases, but John heard it, and he froze. He should flee, he decided, and stood with a scraping of chairleg against flagstone that made him wince.

“Who. Is there?” came the authoritative voice of his boss, and John realised for the umpteenth time that he was already screwed.

“Just me, boss!” he called back, then ground his teeth.

“Egbert?” English replied, appearing from behind a bookshelf.

“I’m just reading,” John replied. “I got the day off because I fell off a lamp.” He felt the heat creeping up his neck.

“How embarrassing,” English said, saving him the trouble of saying so himself. “I came down here. For peace and quiet. But here you are.”

“Actually, so did I,” John said. “I mean, I can leave, sir.”

What a snivelling, supercilious asshole he was. Oh well. Keep the boss happy. Anything for his friends. English’s narrow lip just barely curled, anyway, so it had worked.

“No. Let’s talk,” English said, taking a seat opposite John at the little desk. John sank back onto his chair. “You have heard. About yesterday’s events.”

John felt the walls closing in on his mind again. “Yes.”

“It is embarrassing. That petty criminals. Are serving justice. While our hands are tied.”

John nodded because he thought he should.

“My sister. Has always been pathetic and snivelling. She has been endorsing. Reconciliation. Negotiation.”

He felt a very sudden rush of affection for the mayor, remembering the evening that he and Rose had spent at her event. Her views had been more extreme, then.

“She’s changing her mind about… trolls?” John said, trying very hard to keep his tone inquisitive, conspiratorial, outraged. English narrowed his eyes, and nodded.

He understood what it was like to question these established cultural norms: that trolls are evil, bloodthirsty, cruel. He remembered when he’d first looked into Karkat’s eyes and thought he was a wild, exotic thing – it was bad, obviously, it was fetishisation, and he felt embarrassed about it now, not proud. But anyone who didn’t outright want to murder the trolls was a good enough ally, especially in such a powerful position. Of course, there was still much to question about such views, there was room for improvement, but at least she was receptive. Better than English who now, before him, was white with fury.

“I am tired of listening to her.”

“It sounds like she is a bad leader,” John says. “After all, we know the trolls are a threat, right?”

“That is correct. And her pitiable attitude is spreading. A troll was caught this morning. With a Lamplighter-issued pistol,” English growled, his eyes narrowing to slate slits. John swallowed the lump in his throat, did his best to meet English’s gaze.

A pregnant pause followed. John could feel his upper lip prickling with sweat. He remembered giving Karkat one of his guns this morning. He knew they were all marked with his information. He’d made the last error of judgment that luck would allow.

“The troll escaped. He shot dead one of our new recruits,” English spat out, rage rising as a purple flush in his neck. John suppressed the instinct to settle his hand on one of his guns. “And about an hour after that. Three vagrants were found dead. Bullet wounds. The scene was coated. In troll blood. Purple.”

Gamzee? Eridan? John took a deep, slow breath. He was being accused of treason. He would have to face a firing squad. His luck had finally run out, like he had always thought it would.

Apoplectic, English spat out in disjunct syllables: “I cannot allow. This kind of blatant betrayal. John. Do you understand?” He slammed his fists on the table. His voice had risen to a cold, furious thunder, and John’s hands twitched in his lap as his heart hammered in his throat. His time was already up.

“I understand, sir,” John managed to say, voice a flat line, eye contact unbroken even as the blood vessels in English’s eyes needled hot scarlet against his popping whites.

“Good,” English said, and relaxed back into himself, rolling back his shoulders again, throwing his gaze into the corner of the room. John was both confused and frozen stock still with terror, an unpleasant combination. “I am becoming increasingly frustrated. With the reluctance of others in this organisation. To condone execution.”

“It’s in our statutes,” John said lowly, with absolutely no idea what was going on – still. “They didn’t have to sign up if they didn’t like the terms.” _Please don’t kill me._

“Exactly,” English said curtly. “Your cousin is accused,” he said, and John’s heart skipped a beat.

Jane was going to be executed for something he had done. His face whitened, and he obviously looked disturbed, because English went on: “It was a shock to me. As much as anyone else. She was… capable.”

He had let Karkat borrow a gun this morning, of course. But he hadn’t realised, as he’d set the lent gun on the bedside table, that there was an engraving in the handle – Jane’s name, her rank, her ID number. Jane had let him borrow it months ago. John had thought he’d returned it – obviously not. 

“I can’t believe this,” John offered, feeling himself die inside by the second. The terror subsided but in its place was just cold steel emptiness.

“No. I have placed my trust too lightly. In the past,” English said, slowly but incensed. “She has absconded. I have put a bounty. On her head. But my own men seem reluctant. To bring me her head.”

John saw an in, and he took it. Obviously, he couldn’t live with himself after shooting his last family to death. But here was a chance to cement his position at his boss’ side, without which all of his friends would die. John felt like he was staring down, down into a deep dark crevasse, and he was going all the way down – but this time, it was his choice.

“I’ll do it,” John said. He could see a way out. It was okay. “If I can find her, I’ll do it.”

He felt mainly relieved that Jane had been smart enough to escape, and maybe if he caught up to her, he could warn her to stay away.

“Thank you, John,” English said curtly. “And there is. Another matter.”

“What’s that?” John said, still feeling blessed that, at least for today, nobody had to die. 

“I am going to kill my sister,” English said, without even a trace of emotion besides some strange, sick excitement. “I will take her arm. I will show everyone. How a leader behaves. By taking what he wants.”

John didn’t want to kill anyone else. 

“I need you to be there. To assist me. Because I trust you.”

What to do? With English in power, the situation for the trolls would surely worsen. John suddenly realised that there was nothing he could do about it anymore. All along, he’d feared being nothing more than another nameless, faceless pawn in a game he couldn’t control. But that had always been the plan for him.

The green J floated to the surface of his mind. There was something afoot in the Lower City. They were planning something, some subterfuge, something they’d been hiding from John. J.E.. But not John Egbert. They didn’t really need him.

English was going to take power either way. Maybe John could buy them time; English respected him, trusted him. He would be privy to all of English’s plans. His right-hand man.

He could sense that they were all running out of time. He couldn’t think of anything better to do. He couldn’t think of anything.

“When?” John said, exhausted.

“Christmas. She is throwing a ball. We are invited. I thought that it would be fun. To cause a scene.”

“Right. I’ll be there.”

* * *

After his boss left, John resumed his frenzied investigation. He had found a tome of gun licences granted in the last twenty years. He’d flipped through over six hundred pages, bound in dust. The monotony was keeping the horrors in his head at bay, barely – like the snapping jaws of wolves, they kept advancing. But now, his heart was pounding: there was a signature in green ink. _Jake English_. J.E.. It didn’t give him any new information, and he’d never heard the name before, but it was thrilling all the same. Jake English represented their last real hope of survival. John was quizzical as to Jake’s relation to Lord English, but he felt that was unimportant for now.

Rose’s mom was involved in this, too, somehow. He wondered briefly if he might be able to find anything about her here, and then suddenly remembered that Rose’s mom had spent a lot of time in the Bastille. He couldn’t remember her name – it had been years since he’d last seen her – but before long, John had found the original copy of Rose’s birth certificate. She’d been born in prison. To Roxy Lalonde.

Roxy Lalonde, who he found mentioned repeatedly in case files, and who was currently missing – but fitted with a tracking device. That didn’t make sense… a woman who disappeared off the radar completely while under government surveillance? Yeah, that sounded like a Lalonde to him.

Almost every mention of Roxy’s name had the same two letters scribbled above it: M.C..

He spent the next four hours poring over court cases and ancient tomes of criminal law. He kept happening upon sections that had been scribbled, ripped or blacked out, until finally – _finally_ – he found a single reference to M.C.. They were the Midnight Crew.

He had no idea who they were. He didn’t know what they had been up to, recently or in history – every trace of their activity had been wiped from the archives. But Roxy Lalonde had something to do with them. Roxy and her cat, Jaspers, who Vriska had used to orchestrate a murder via the assassin Jake English. These were powerful people, on the side of the Lower City.

John actually breathed a sigh of relief, for what felt like the first time in months.

Many questions remained. All of this was a secret that his friends had been keeping from him – what did it portend, now, that he knew? Was it dangerous? But he felt a magnetic pull back to the investigation: he had to know. He wanted to do something to help, usher their plan along, because times were getting more and more desperate, and surely they had to have a happy ending. John had to make certain of that.

* * *

“Something bad might happen,” John said.

He and Karkat were alone in a beautiful, ornate room; everyone else had gone to bed, and they were up late. The walls were papered in crimson, waxed hardwood underfoot, chandelier overhead glowing pure gold. Eridan’s home was so stunning and as ever, John felt out of place. They sat on the edge of a four poster bed, staring across at the bay window, whose curtains were pulled aside to reveal a glassy view of bleeding colours and distant, burnt-out buildings, and a hanging smoke whose belly glistened with light. It was the evening, and everything was very subdued, and very quiet.

“What is it?” Karkat rasped, quietly, reaching over to clasp one of John’s hands. John didn’t even know how to begin to explain.

“Did you shoot someone yesterday?” was the first thing John elected to say, and Karkat prickled.

“I meant to tell you when you came in earlier, but Eridan got in the way,” Karkat said immediately, “I wasn’t going to keep it a secret.”

Eridan had wanted to see John so badly, and John had just managed to fake a smile for him. For long enough to keep him happy. Nobody knew what he had done.

“I’m not angry. This is my fault. I accidentally gave you someone else’s gun. The Lamplighters found it,” John said, forcing out each sentence and fragment with great pain. The light in here was very, very dim, lending just a subtle gilt to things, and he liked it. He liked not having to look Karkat in the eyes, too.

“Shit. Shit – whose was it?”

“It was Jane’s. I don’t think you know her, but. She’s my cousin. My boss wants me to find her and kill her, but I can’t.”

“Shit, John, I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have dropped the gun, I was so scared – where is she? Is she safe?”

“My boss said she got away but I don’t know where she is,” John said, looking desperate. “She was my only family, and now she’s gone.”

John made the monumental mistake of turning to look at Karkat.

He must’ve washed since yesterday because his hair was no longer a bloodsoaked mat, but a soft mane of loose curls. John could tell Sollux had fed him a good meal: his complexion was ruddy, his grey skin salmon-tinged, almost dewy. But his yellow eyes were blaring scarlet at the edges, and there were tears tipping down his cheeks. He looked so small, in an oversized sweater and boxer shorts, and John realised that he didn’t – he couldn’t – have all the answers. It was unfair of him to have expected Karkat to fix this; all he could do was listen. The lilting light of the chandelier cast deep shadows into the hollows of Karkat’s cheeks, and under his eyes.

“It’s not your fault,” Karkat said.

“It isn’t your fault, either,” John retorted. “I wouldn’t have had to give you a gun if – if things were different – I can’t stand this, Karkat! I am trying really hard to not get sad about it, and it isn’t working anymore!”

“No, listen,” Karkat insisted, and wrapped his arms hard around John’s shoulders. John sat very still, trying to feel something. “John, you’re doing your best, you poor fucker, and I love you for that.”

John buried his face into Karkat’s chest. He smelled so good, like something burnt, caramelly and delicious.

“If you hadn’t given me the gun, I would’ve died. It was just an accident. If she got away then she must be safe for now.”

“I just wanted everyone to be safe,” John said. “I want all of you to be happy, and to not have to worry about stuff! I never wanted anyone to have to die.”

“I’m so sorry,” Karkat murmured into John’s shoulder. “I wish we would have just left you alone… I – I’ve been so selfish, this whole time. I’ve been a fucking asshole. I couldn’t get over you. I can’t.”

Karkat’s voice spiked and his sobs defeated him. John realised it must have been exhausting to feel so intensely all the time, and he managed to force his hands up and around Karkat’s waist, pulling him closer. He could feel a rampant heartbeat in his ear, and blistering warmth, and desperate hands clawing at his shirt.

“I will probably never get over you, either. Sorry,” John said, and Karkat scrambled to hold him even closer, even harder, sniffling. 

“I don’t want you to have to do this stuff,” Karkat gravelled, pressing his face hard into John’s neck. He felt warm and sticky with tears, but his hair was so soft. “I didn’t think it was going to get this bad.”

John had to say it: “It’s going to get worse.”

“It can’t – what do you mean?” Karkat gasped. “I thought – you said things were going well, at work, didn’t you? Before? What happened?”

“My boss… he still wants to usurp the mayor, but he’s – something has changed about him, he’s more dangerous now,” John said. “I do not know what to do. I know you guys have a secret plan you’re working on, so I thought –”

“How much do you know about that?” Karkat snapped suddenly, and John flushed.

“Uh… probably more than I should.”

“John!”

Karkat pulled away from him, then. The indignity of this had stopped his crying, and instead he reddened by the second, up to the points of his ears. Karkat dug his fingers into John’s shoulders, eyes narrowing.

John cut across him before he could even start ranting. “I know it’s meant to be your big secret and everything, but I am putting myself in a lot of danger for you and I do not think it’s very fair –”

“John, no. It’ll be even more dangerous if you know too much about our stuff.”

“Dangerous how? Because you are in a lot more trouble than you think,” John said. “My boss is planning something. Something really bad.”

“It’s… it’s complicated.”

“Karkat!” John didn’t usually get angry, but he couldn’t stand this anymore. “How long are you all going to treat me like a kid?! I killed someone today! For you! And it – it – it fucking sucked!”

“This is going to be really, really hard for you to believe, Egbert,” Karkat said, and John felt a horrible muddle of anger and affection at being referred to by his surname, “But I swear all I want to do is keep you safe.”

“I’m not the one in mortal danger all of the time!” John prickled. “Listen! You can’t stop me from finding out about your plan. I am going to read literally all of the books I can find, seeing as none of you want to tell me anything! And then –”

Karkat made an angry face, but John just carried on.

“ _And then_ I am going to make sure it turns out right!”

“Why do you have to be such a stubborn, fucking _insufferable_ –”

“I know you are, but what am I?” John joked, before he could stop himself.

“Oh, that’s really mature, Egbert,” Karkat snapped. “ _Wow_. Your rapier wit is so impressive. I am literally swooning.”

“Yes.”

“Why do you always play the hero? You know you can’t do everything.”

John faltered, hurt.

“Ugh, sorry. You are a hero. You meathead,” Karkat sighed, moony-eyed. “My hero. Holy shit, that was pathetic. Can I retract that statement?”

“No.”

There was no way of getting over Jane’s disappearance, and there was no time to brood about it now. He had to ignore it, think about something else, stay positive. Keep everyone safe. One day, maybe it would all make sense. Right now all that mattered in the entire universe was being a hero for tiny, angry Karkat.

“John…” Karkat said, and John thought he might be about to say something really romantic. “Seriously, please tell me how much you know about our plan. It’s really important.”

“Ugh, fine,” John groaned, pretending like he had been really difficult to win over. “Well, I know about that J guy. Jake English, right? And Rose’s mom has something to do with this. I found out that she’s supposed to be being tracked… but no one knows where she is!”

Karkat seemed to relax.

“And they’re part of something called the Midnight Crew?”

And then Karkat twitched, eyes bugging, and he shook his head. “Stop.”

“Okay, fine, but Karkat, how come nobody knows where she is?”

“I shouldn’t – I can’t tell you that.”

“Please?”

“I _can’t_ – alright, listen. We are trying to protect you. We want you to survive this. Also, we want you to not blurt everything out to your boss if he decides to torture you,” Karkat said. “I can’t give you any details. All you need to know is that there is a safehouse but we can’t go there right now. You have to delay whatever your boss has planned for us until we can leave. Can you do that?”

“Sure!”

“And will you quit asking about it, now? There is no way I can tell you any more. And quit prying! No more books.”

“Well, you kind of told me everything I need to know already.”

“There is so much more that I could tell you. If I hadn’t _literally sworn on my life_ –”

“You kind of suck at keeping secrets, dude.”

“Feferi was going to tell you anyway!”

“Wait, do you talk about me when I’m not here?”

The thought made him a little happy.

“Sometimes. Mostly about how terrible you are. Because you are so terrible.”

Karkat tilted his head very slowly, and very gently, to press his lips against John’s jawbone, then to his ear. Was he kidding? He was probably kidding. It was difficult to know, when it was Karkat.

“Literally the worst,” he murmured, kissing John’s earlobe. John felt himself weaken at the touch.

It made John uncomfortable when things got so pessimistic and serious. He liked this, these things that Karkat had told him: that he just had to hold out for another month, to be a hero; that the Midnight Crew would save them. It would be cool, meeting Rose’s mom, and this stranger mercenary Jake who had saved his life, but that thought was quashed pretty quickly by Karkat sliding a hand under his shirt.

“Hey there,” John said, voice jumping on the lump in his throat.

“I know this isn’t hugely romantic, and I know you’ve been through a lot today, and I know we’re both bruised and battered to hell, but John… wanna make love?”

John felt his heart swell up like a balloon.

“Make love? That is pretty romantic, Karkat,” John said.

“I want to be close. I want you to know… I want you to know how I love you,” Karkat said, pressing into John’s shoulders. John yielded, laying back on the bed. They shifted and shuffled a little so that Karkat sat across his hips, leaning down with his head to John’s chest.

“I love you. I love you. This is still all so weird and… and cool. I love you,” John spat out.

John could feel Karkat’s breath, hot between his collarbones. He was pressing his fingernails gently into John’s ribs, under his shirt.

“How can you always be so happy?” Karkat said.

“Because I have you.”

“Oh my god, you fucking dork,” Karkat grumbled, then kissed the hollow of John’s throat.

John found him so cute. He lifted his hands to tangle his fingers in Karkat’s hair, gently circling the tips of his stubby horns with his thumbs. Karkat whined, a puppyish sound that reminded John of how precious he was, and suddenly bucked his hips, rubbing hard against John’s crotch – very warm and very intense through the thin fabric of his underwear.

“Holy crap,” John squeaked, and Karkat lifted his head, scarlet in the face. John swallowed the lump in his throat. And then Karkat ground his hips again, slower, rubbing up against him, and John dropped his hands to Karkat’s shoulders, where he held on hard.

“This okay?” Karkat said hoarsely, and John could only just jerk his head up and down. “You still have your glasses on.”

John said, “Uh,” and Karkat took his glasses off for him, and set them on the end table.

“You’re cute, for a human.”

“You’re – you are the best thing I have ever seen,” John said, staring up at him like he was a miracle. He was.

Karkat took off his sweater and threw it aside, revealing a whole mess of half-healed wounds and bruises as swollen and coloured as ripe fruit. John struggled out of his own shirt, just to uncover the same story: a patchwork, a wreck of tender flesh. One day they’d have scars that told one hell of a story.

Immediately, Karkat dipped his head and kissed a line along John’s collarbone. With this he pushed his hips forward again, rutting against John, and John strained underneath him, took half a shaky gasp and groaned. Every single day in this god forsaken place felt like a century of being maimed and torn apart, and to be here, now, with Karkat touching him like this – he couldn’t describe.

“Are you okay?” John managed to spit out, trailing a hand down Karkat’s side as gently as possible. Karkat flinched, then leaned in.

“Yeah. That tickles,” he said, muffled from where his mouth was pushed up against John’s chest. John’s fingers stalled at the waistband of Karkat’s boxers, but only briefly; he pushed his hand under and Karkat took a sudden hiss of breath. John wasn’t going to tease him. He wasn’t like that. He let Karkat thrust forward into his hand, threading the other into his hair. Karkat lifted his head and slammed his lips to John’s mouth, just as John flicked a thumb over the head of Karkat’s cock.

Karkat practically mewled into his mouth. Eyes half-lidded, John could kind of see what was going on – that Karkat was jerking his hips arrhythmically, almost in time with John’s slow pumping –

“Stop, stop,” Karkat suddenly said, and John’s heart dropped, but he took his hand back. “Wait a second –”

He was all gruff and confused-sounding, and so red. John couldn’t speak. Karkat righted himself and struggled for a second before tossing his underwear on the floor, and John’s quickly followed. Karkat grabbed John’s wrists and pulled him up so he was sat, Karkat kneeling across his thighs.

“This is better,” Karkat said.

“Better for what?”

Then Karkat grabbed John’s hand and guided it down again – John wrapped his fingers around Karkat’s cock, thumb playing the top, smearing a little precum. Karkat tilted his head back, sighing with deep contentment, before brushing his palm up against John’s erection. 

“Oh. Yes,” John said, staring earnestly at Karkat. Karkat arched his back a little, pushing his cock up into John’s hand, and John took it, jerking it as slowly as he dared just to prolong this one perfect moment: Karkat huffing, biting his lip, eyes screwed shut – Karkat’s hand was just hovering over the tip of his cock and he tried very hard not to be rude about it but –

“Karkat, _please_ ,” John bleated.

“Fuck, sorry,” Karkat said, taking back his hand. John almost whined, but Karkat licked his palm before returning it, warm and moist, to John’s shaft, sliding up the length, thumbing the slit – John could feel that the hand he was using to jerk Karkat was getting more erratic but he couldn’t help it – and, shit, Karkat didn’t seem to care. A moment of divine inspiration made John pick up his free hand and settle it in Karkat’s hair, thumbing a tiny, sensitive horn, and Karkat actually cried out from behind gritted teeth. His cock was hot and slick under John’s fingers, and every shaky moan Karkat let out pushed John further, somehow, there was something about watching him, heady and whimpering, it was so hot, it was so unreal.

“You okay?” John breathed. Karkat’s cock was twitching in his hand. He couldn’t even describe the sensation.

“Yes, fuck, I’m gonna –” Karkat choked, and John didn’t let up. Karkat pushed his head up against John’s hand and John pinched the little horn between his thumb and finger, and suddenly Karkat stalled, cried out, and came, and John stroked him, pushing him over the edge, covering his fingers in sticky pink cum. John didn’t even have time to say something embarrassing and ruin the moment before Karkat grabbed his shoulders, pushed him back so that he was prone, and took the tip of his cock into his mouth, hollowing his cheeks as he sucked on it – holy fucking hell – Karkat slid his tongue down the length, suckling with soft, wet lips – it was about four seconds before John was a writhing mess, and back arching he came hard into Karkat’s accommodating mouth. He couldn’t tell what he was yelling, but it was definitely something.

“Can you two in there _shut the fuck up?_ ” came Eridan’s muffled voice from the bedroom next door, followed by frustrated banging on the wall.

“Oh shit, was I loud?” John said, and Karkat snorted, wiping his mouth before shifting his weight to collapse next to John.

They lay there quiet and still for a while, holding hands, just breathing, cooling down.

“I love you,” John eventually said. Karkat didn’t reply for a second, and John thought he might have fallen asleep –

“I’m scared. If I lose you, I don’t know how the fuck I’m gonna make it out of this,” Karkat said.

John squeezed his hand.

“You won’t lose me.”

“I want to see you grow old, Egbert. I don’t even care if it’s with me or not, I just… I can’t stand the thought of you dying for me.”

“I’m not going to die,” John said. “And, it would be kind of cool to be old with you. Maybe then we could relax for once.”

Karkat barked a tiny bitter laugh.

“God, everything’s so fucked,” he sighed, shuffling over to curl up half-on John, head against his chest.

“I will always try to help you, Karkat. No matter what happens. For as long as we are both still here.”

Karkat kissed one of John’s bruises, with the lightest pressure.

“I hate seeing you get hurt for me. For us. But I know I can’t stop you.”

“I don’t really mind,” John said. “I mean, the pain and stuff. I would do anything for you. Ugh, that sounds corny.”

He felt the pressure as Karkat squeezed him hard around the middle.

“I wouldn’t ask you to put your life in danger. I can’t even believe you do this shit. But I’m so glad.”

“I love you. I am going to fix all this. I will figure it out.”

He kissed the top of Karkat’s head, and pulled the blankets up so that they covered the both of them. If he didn’t have Karkat, his world would surely stop turning. It was far, far too late to back away from this mess they were in – he had to make it better.


	22. Somebody's Gonna Get Hurt

**Notes for the Chapter:**

>  **Trigger warnings:** Violence, gore, drugs mention.

A few weeks later, John slept quietly with Karkat in his room in Eridan’s house. He had gone to great lengths to seek out Jane, to warn her, to show his boss that he was dedicated to the cause of her execution, but she had always been a mystery even to those who knew her.

A strange noise woke John in the early hours of the morning. He sat bolt upright, which made the mattress groan and Karkat stirred irritably, clutching the blankets closer. John listened hard, but the sound ebbed and disappeared. He threw a cursory glance around the room – nothing strange here, just discarded clothes and bedlinen collecting dusty lantern’s glow.

He rubbed his eyes with the backs of his hands, trying to wring out the blurriness – Karkat had settled next to him, and John did not disturb him as he pushed himself carefully out of bed, padded across the room and dressed himself. Slabs of fawn-colour light flowed over him. He was vaguely aware that his heart was surging in his chest; the noises were coming from downstairs, sounded like someone opening cupboards, tossing things aside. But he hadn’t heard anyone come in. He eased the door open with just a creak and clicked it near-silently behind him.

Out on the landing, he was alone; accompanied only by floorboards squeaking underfoot, he picked his way down the poorly-lit stairs – most of the lanterns had burned out overnight, so all around him the shadows of marble columns and chandeliers had settled. Standing in the centre of the main entrance hall he could see the archway leading to the kitchen was throwing out fresh yellow light – and noise. He crept close to the arch, swallowing to ease the dryness in his throat, breathing deep through his nose to still his heart. He was unarmed, so he just had to keep quiet.

John pushed his head around the doorframe very carefully, very slowly, only to spy Vriska standing alone at the counter. He clapped his hand over his mouth to keep himself from yelling out loud, even though she was no enemy. Then he got a better look at her, his heart palpitating wildly, still, trying to come down from waves of crashing adrenaline.

He was alarmed by how small she looked, wearing just an oversized mauve nightshirt that he presumed she’d borrowed from Eridan. She was leaning hard against the counter with her remaining arm, cursing under her breath. In her wake, she had left cupboard doors open and stacks of plates, cups and nondescript boxes had been pushed aside or cluttered the counters.

“Vriska? Are you okay?” John called out from the doorframe.

“Get lost, you fucker,” she snapped back, almost immediately. That was no less civil than she usually was with him, so he walked in anyway.

Eridan’s kitchen was cavernous and full of intimidating shadows, thrown all about by the low-burning braziers set in the walls. His feet padded quietly on cool marble. As he drew closer to Vriska, he could see her trembling – she looked worse at this distance. John deduced she’d woken up early to avoid everyone, to her own detriment.

“Vriska?”

“Leave me alone!” Vriska growled at him, her head snapping so that she could glare at him, with a whirl of wild, jet black hair. There was a bandage over her left eye – the seven pupils of the other were dilated in the low light and pointing at him like gun barrels, each surrounded by just a sliver of sapphire blue. The yellow was streaked with red, her eyes underlined by bags practically the length of her face. She jutted her jaw defiantly. Behind her, he could see that she’d been struggling with – amongst other things – some bandages and ointment from a first aid kit.

“Do you need help?” John said, and the corners of her lips turned even further down.

“Fuck you. Fuck this. Fuck everything,” she spat, enunciating every syllable with sick and furious relish.

“If it helps, I feel that too,” John said. “I can change your bandages and stuff. Anyone would struggle to do that in your, uh, condition.”

“My condition? My fucking _condition?_ ”

“Well, you know,” John said, gesturing at where her other arm had been.

“You tactless asshole,” Vriska said, eye narrowing. “My arm’s trash now. It’ll rust. Tavros isn’t around anymore to stick it back in. I can barely see a damn thing. So, to be succinct, I’m fucked. Fuckety-fuck-fucked.”

“It is okay to need help sometimes.”

“No!” Vriska yelped, a little over-loud. “It isn’t! It really sucks! I was the strongest and now I am totally useless.”

“Please let me help you. I will not think any less of you,” John said. “Besides, you could probably still kick my ass.”

Vriska turned her head away with a huff, and then side-eyed him.

“I know you’re pandering to me, human John,” she said. “But I like it, so whatever. I’ll let you help me.”

She turned a chair at the head of the long kitchen table and sat to face him, and John carried the first aid supplies over. He reached behind her head and gently lifted her wild tangle of hair, so that he could un-knot the bandage wound around her eye. As he pulled it away, it stuck a little, and Vriska hissed out of irritation or pain. John made the mistake of looking down into the cavernous hole where her eye had used to be, and grimaced. It was very much a fresh and horrible wound; where the skin had closed it looked like translucent onion peel, but bright blue, and there was clotted navy blood gumming up the hole.

He poured a little iodine onto a gauze pad and lightly rubbed around her eyesocket, very gentle around the lip of the gaping wound.

“How did this happen? I mean, if you want to say,” John said, nervously.

“When there was the fire… some human got the jump on me and stabbed me in the damn eye,” Vriska said. “I thought it was alright – it just _hurt_ – but then I realised I was looking at my own eyeball jammed on a knife, and figured something was up. Then he started yammering something about blowing up the warehouse.”

John winced. He had always known Vriska was tough, but that was unreal.

“Obviously that caught me off guard,” she went on. “Then while I was trying to wipe the blood out of my other eye so I could locate the little fucker and _kill him_ for destroying my warehouse, he wrenched my arm out of its socket.”

“Ouch. You got him in the end, though,” John said, now packing clean gauze into Vriska’s eyesocket, trying not to be affected by how grisly this was.

“Yes. It was close, though. It doesn’t make me feel any better,” she said, and John nodded.   
“Is there any other way of putting your arm back?”

She shook her head – as she did, her hair moved as one wild, untameable mass.

“We have mechanics, but nobody like Tavros,” she sighed. “Well, there’s one guy. Human. But he’s in prison on a life sentence. So I had better just get used to this crap.”

John wrapped a fresh bandage around her head, fastening it tightly.

“Listen, I wanted to tell you something,” John said, and Vriska eyed him. “I know that you fixed things for me when that guy saw me in the Lower City. I – I just wanted you to know that… that was really cool and amazing. I know you didn’t do that for me, or anything, but just to say… you are so great.”

“Of course I did it for you, dumbass,” Vriska said back, grinning. “Everyone else too, sure, but I didn’t wanna see you dead. That’d be messed up.”

“Thanks, Vriska.”

As John tidied away the first aid materials, another figure appeared in the doorframe. It was Feferi, wearing a cerulean blue nightdress, which John struggled to fathom for a second before she crossed the room to where Vriska was sitting, and wrapped her arms around Vriska’s shoulders. John felt the heat crawling up his neck.

“You’re making Egbert uncomfortable,” he heard Vriska murmur quietly, and Feferi snorted.

“He and Karkat are worse,” she said, hoarsely. She sounded exhausted, but still playful, still kind.

“That is kind of mean,” John said. He hadn’t known Feferi and Vriska were red for each other.

“Whatever, loser,” Vriska said.

“John, will you wake Karkat and the others? I would like to hold a meeting,” Feferi said, and John nodded, before disappearing.

* * *

It seemed that several people had already moved into Eridan’s; they were now all gathered in his ornate sitting room. Aradia, Terezi and Dave were here, along with of course Karkat. Feferi sat beside Eridan on a chaise longue – Vriska sat on the floor in front of Feferi, leaning against her legs. Sollux was next to Eridan, looking slumped and exhausted – much like the rest of them. 

“A lot of the city has been destroyed,” Feferi sighed. “As far as I know, those who aren’t here are still safe somewhere, but who knows for how long.”

“This place is good for now,” Eridan said, and Feferi nodded. “All of you can stay here.”

“There’s room for the others, if we need it?”

“Should be,” Eridan said.

“Pleathe don’t make me clean any more roomth,” Sollux muttered, and Eridan snorted.

“Anyway,” Feferi said sharply. She had taken a strand of Vriska’s hair and was running it between her fingers. “As everyone here should now know, Roxy Lalonde is trapped in a safe location until her sentence is up, in about four weeks.”

“If possible, I would like us to stay here until Roxy can meet with us in person. Jade is currently mediating this from within the Bastille. I have received word that she has also made contact with, uh, that other guy that we all know is in prison but can’t say the name of!”

By now, John was used to people censoring themselves around him.

“Vriska and Sollux – today I would like for you to work on sealing the entrances into this place. We can’t close the tunnels, but we can make it harder for them to get in. I trust you will be able to find the necessary materials?”

“Well, our warehouse is shot, but we can probably salvage something,” Vriska said, and Sollux nodded. “I also only have one fucking arm and eyeball, but that’s not so inconvenient.”

“Great. That’ll eliminate one threat,” Feferi said.

“Our other problem’s the Lamplighters. John?” Eridan said, and John felt hot as many eyes pointed in his direction.

“Okay, uh, well,” John started, and on his other side, Karkat leaned against him. “My boss has kind of turned into a dictator. He wants to overthrow the mayor, which sucks because I think she is changing her mind about you. But I’m not sure how to stop him. If I can stop him, even.”

“Don’t even try,” Eridan said, right away, and Feferi stared at him – not quite in shock, but in question. “Let him do what he wants to do, kill the mayor, whatever. I don’t care about politics. Just, put him off a’ doing anythin’ here. Keep him happy. Sweet-talk him. Suck his damn dick if you have to. Stall him for as long as we need.”

“That could probably work,” Feferi agreed, shrugging. “What’s the situation like, John?”

“Well, uh, he wants to assassinate the mayor at her Christmas ball.”

“You’re kidding,” Dave said suddenly. “That is dope as hell.”

“That’s a shitty way to talk about someone dying, you fuckhole,” Karkat rasped.

“Nah, I just mean, man, that’s some classy shit. What I wouldn’t give to see that go down.”

John faltered, and then he grinned.

“Hey, you wanna come?”

“Are you kidding me?” Vriska immediately said, but not before Dave could say, “Hell yes, bro.”

“I am surrounded by children!” Vriska despaired, throwing up her arm, and Feferi giggled behind her hands. 

“We can probably do that!” John said, beaming at Dave.

“Do we have plans for Christmas?” Aradia suddenly said, and all eyes turned in her direction.

“We should make some,” Feferi said. “It would be nice.”

John noticed suddenly that Karkat was looking at him in a very odd, kind of tender way. He had half-expected Karkat to be apoplectic with rage about _pointless human traditions_ , but he wasn’t, not at all. John’s cheeks burned with heat, but all the same he couldn’t bring himself to look away for a moment.

“We could do somethin’ here,” Eridan said. “Have everyone over. Maybe cook up somethin’ – I bet we could throw somethin’ together.”

Suddenly, though, there was a sound like someone had crashed headlong into the front door – John jumped out of his skin as did just about everyone nearby. Dave leapt to his feet and left the room – John was up in an instant but Karkat grabbed him hard around the wrist, wrenching him back even as he struggled – the battering against the front door didn’t let up but intensified, a series of blows that increased in desperation, and then an inhuman wail – the sound of Dave swinging the door open, a series of thumps, and two separate exclamations.

“What the fuck –” Sollux and Eridan said at the same time, before the door slammed, and hurried footsteps approached.

Dave re-emerged a second later, carrying a limp body in his arms. Behind him, Gamzee, similarly carrying somebody – he cut a very recognisable figure. Suddenly John realised Gamzee was covered in blood, several shades, including his own. Bright red was seeping through Dave’s white shirt, too.

He had Rose. Gamzee held Kanaya, who was ashen. They were both wet with blood and limp as rags. John felt numb.

“Wh – wh – what happened?!” Karkat spat out, scrambling to his feet and rushing over to shoo Eridan and Feferi from the chaise longue. They all propped Rose and Kanaya up there, and Sollux thrust a box into Karkat’s hands: a first aid kit.

“Stay out a’ Karkat’s way,” Eridan said, herding everyone back with an imperious wave of his arm. John crossed the room and grabbed Eridan by the shoulder, frowning, but Eridan shrugged him off.

“Gamzee – what happened to them?” Feferi said, wheeling around to face Gamzee who looked uncharacteristically distressed; the yellows of his eyes were wide and popping against his painted, blood-smeared face – jade green, scarlet, rich purple. “Everyone sit back down, please.”

John sank back into a chair, swallowing hard, and others followed suit, leaving Gamzee and Feferi facing off, and Karkat attending to Kanaya and Rose.

“I don’t know, I don’t know,” Gamzee was muttering, and he grabbed his own hair, frowning deeply. He looked perturbed – confused. “I found them like this. And then I found the motherfuckers who did it. Well they ain’t gonna bother no one no more. But look…”

Gamzee gestured to Rose and Kanaya.

“They got all – fucked up.”

His lower lip buckled and quivered, and he took a deep, shaky breath, knuckles knotted deep in his matted hair and pulling.

“Karkat…” Feferi said quietly, and without a word, Karkat handed her the first aid kit, stepped back, and turned – on tiptoes – to circle Gamzee’s shoulders with his little arms. All John could hear was quiet _shoosh_ ing and whimpers.

John hadn’t known what to think of Gamzee. He still didn’t know very much about him – as far as John knew, he seemed protective, and kind, and sweet and gentle. And so strong, strong enough that he could probably kill them all, if he wanted. John had this strange feeling that Gamzee had been badly hurt, once. Taken advantage of?

He realised he was being too introspective, and hopped up to join Feferi, grabbing gauze and iodine from the first aid kit. Behind him, conversation continued.

“We need to find out if there’s anyone still around,” Eridan said, grimly. “Terezi, Dave?”

Both stood. John glanced over his shoulder. Terezi looked murderous; Dave, disaffected. They were both so strong, so different.

“We’ll find them,” Dave said.

“And eviscerate them,” Terezi said, scowling so that all her teeth were showing.

They left.

“Vriska, Sollux – leave now, take guns, and block all a’ the entrances. If you see any human –”

“You don’t need to tell us what to do with those fuckers,” Vriska snarled. In a whirl of thicketed hair, Vriska stalked out. Sollux followed, looking comparatively meek even as he bristled with anger.

Karkat and Gamzee had settled onto the floor, sitting cross-legged opposite each other, leaning in so that their foreheads were touching.

John returned his full attention to Rose. He had wiped away most of the spilled blood – virulent green and purple, cut with scarlet which welled up fresh and tumbled down. Her white blonde hair, colour of an incandescent lamp, was dyed bright robin red; she’d been clubbed in the head. Her arms were torn and textured with lacerations and fresh, mashed bruises – like a bunch of rotten fruit. It looked like she’d put up a fight.

“Why?” he suddenly said aloud, pressing a gauze pad against the wound on Rose’s head. Beside him, Aradia had joined Feferi to work on Kanaya, and they both turned their heads in his direction.

“Interspecies relationships,” Aradia said simply, then turned away again, back to peeling away the remnants of Kanaya’s cast. She had broken her collarbones not days before. “Most likely. They are… very frowned upon. By your people. By ours, until recently.”

“This is insane,” Eridan thundered. John had never really known him to get angry. “We can’t live like this! Is there anyone here who ain’t been beaten half to death?!”

Gamzee whimpered – in fear? – and Karkat made a furious gesture at Eridan.

“Sorry,” Eridan said. “Look, it just ain’t safe out there anymore. Once those four get back, everyone is stayin’ the fuck _here_.”

“You think that will keep us safe?” Aradia said, turning to look at him. She knew him well – was the most likely to question his authority and get away with it.

“It means we can look after each other,” Feferi said. “I have to agree. We will be safer together.”

“Rose? Can you hear me?” John said.

She had already started to stir, twitching her arms away from where John was wiping them with iodine. Beside her, Kanaya was still slack, arms hanging at terrible angles.

“Rose?”

Rose’s eyes opened to very narrow slits – one was swollen almost wholly shut where she’d been punched in the face – and she frowned.

“How is Kanaya?” she said, immediately.

“Not awake yet,” Feferi said. “She’ll be fine.”

“A gang of men ambushed us,” Rose said, quietly turning her cheek towards John so that he could dab at a graze on her face. “I did not have much time to act – I fell. Or perhaps I was hit. How did we come to be here?”

“Gamzee,” John said. “He said he found you unconscious, so he must have scared those guys off, or something.”

“Fortuitous,” Rose said.

“No shit,” Eridan interjected, running his fingers through his hair, skimming over the stumps where his horns had once been.

“We might’ve fought them off if there were two, or three… but there were many.”

“Gamzee killed ‘em all,” Eridan said. “Then he brought you here.”

“May I see him? John?”

John fastened a bandage around the worst of the wounds on Rose’s arms – she wasn’t too badly hurt, all in all. Then they all switched positions – Eridan led Gamzee over to Rose, before sitting down on the floor with Karkat. John joined them. 

“You know he killed three guys the other day, too?” Karkat said, looking vicious. Suddenly John remembered his boss telling him about the murder – three men, purple blood, bullet wounds. Dismemberment. “The other week, when I was attacked in the Upper City. Gamzee found the guys who did it.”

“Shit,” Eridan said. “John, your people didn’t see him?”

“They found the guys dead and, uh, ripped up,” John remembered. “And there was purple blood, so they knew it was a troll for sure. But if they had seen him, he would be dead. Or at least shot at.”

Rose had let Gamzee lay his great head in her lap, like a faithful animal. She stroked his hair. Beside them, Feferi and Aradia had set Kanaya’s arms back into slings.

“Right. Right,” Eridan said.

“He’s going to get himself killed,” Karkat said, solemnly, throwing a weathered glance in Gamzee’s direction. “He’s erratic at best. And he’s scared – terrified – of losing any of us. All of us.”

“Well, he can stay here,” Eridan said.

“You know he’s still addicted?” Karkat snapped. “Let’s be clear. If you screw him over again because you don’t like his habits –”

“Karkat –” John attempted.

“Shut up, Egbert. You don’t know anything about this,” Karkat said. He looked like a snake ready to kill. John had never seen anything so menacing. “If you kick him out, or give him any shit, I will be fucking leaving too, and you will never see either of us again, because we more than likely will be _fucking dead_.”

“Kar, you know I’m sorry about that stuff I said,” Eridan said. “I know, it was wrong. It was a long time ago.”

This must have happened before John had ever met any of them. He occupied himself by looking over to where Kanaya had woken, face near-white and contorted with pain – but she still allowed Rose’s arm around her, tentatively.

“He would do anything for you. Any one of us,” Karkat growled. “And you’d kick him out because he smokes a little.”

“I wouldn’t kick him out. I’m not a dumbass kid anymore, Kar. I get it. I was fuckin’ horrible, back then.”

“Right. Good,” Karkat snapped, and then got to his feet and squeezed between Aradia and Feferi, to help with the dressing of Kanaya’s wounds.

“John, I’m gonna go find Nepeta and Equius,” Eridan said, and John nodded. “You… you can stay here, if you want.”

They both stood, and then John faltered. He was supposed to be Eridan’s moirail – he reached to clasp Eridan’s wrist in his hand. It felt so narrow and fragile, and he could feel Eridan’s pulse throbbing.

“Eridan, are you okay?” he said, and Eridan shrugged, trying to pull his hand away – but he conceded.

“No. I’m – this is fuckin’ me up, John.”

“It will be better when everyone is together. When you know the entrances are closed,” John said. “No one else has to get hurt.” _Or die,_ he added silently.

“You really believe that?” Eridan said, and stared him hard in the eye. He looked as tired as any of the rest of them, but somehow worse, or deadened – he had no horns, but his attackers had taken far more than that from him. And now to know that he was near-powerless to defend his friends… John knew the feeling. It hurt.

“I wish I could promise you something,” John sighed.

Eridan just shook his head.

“What’s the point anymore? What is the god damned point?” he muttered, eyes narrowing. “Can’t keep no-one safe. Can’t hold on to fuckin’ anythin’.”

“You can,” John insisted, but Eridan jerked his hand away, and left.

* * *

After dinner that evening, everyone had gathered in the sitting room in little groups. Sollux had lit a few more of the lanterns and the chandelier, so the room was practically incandescent – curtains carefully closed, so nobody had to know. Karkat, Kanaya and Rose were together on a sofa, talking and laughing and only occasionally wincing in pain. Equius was sat with his (newly broken, it transpired) leg propped up, with Nepeta, Aradia and Feferi. Bec lay nearby in front of a roaring fire. Eridan and Sollux were together in armchairs facing the fire, holding hands and looking like they’d been married for fourty years, which was a beautiful thing to see. Finally Vriska, Terezi and Gamzee were sat cross-legged on the floor, drawing together – he assumed this was for Gamzee’s benefit, but Vriska was weirdly into it, and Terezi kept hoarding crayons so she could smell them.

“She is so weird,” Dave said, watching his matesprit idly. He was sat across from John at a small table, set just a little ways away from the rest of the group. “She’s so… cool.”

John cracked a grin. “Perfect for you.”

“You think I’m weird? Dude.”

“A little. You want to watch the mayor get, uh, killed and stuff.”

“Just morbid curiosity.”

“That’s normal?”

“John, being stuck here is making me crazy,” Dave said. His face was completely impenetrable as ever, but John believed him. “I used to be able to walk out into the city, step away from feeling like everyone I like is gonna die, and act like a normal dude for five minutes. But now I can’t leave, ‘cause they treat me like a leper out there. I’m so bored. Give me a break.”

“Right. Sure,” John said. “Well, me and Rose snuck into one of the mayor’s things a… forever ago. You just have to dress fancy. And, uh, maybe no shades.”

“Dude.”

“They kind of give you away.”

“Dude, no –”

“ _Anyway,_ ” John said, ignoring what he assumed was Dave glowering behind his glasses. “Just act natural. I will tell them you’re a plus one. Oh, and you have to use a fake name!”

“No kidding,” Dave said, and John frowned. “Here I was, thinking I could just show up in there all like, yeah, I’m Dave Strider, and it would just totally fly, they’d be like, hey bro, heard you like trolls –”

“My boss probably will make a move during the mayor’s speech around ten o’clock,” John went on. If he let him, Dave would literally never shut up. Kind of like Karkat. “The whole place is gonna be full of Lamplighters so when I signal to you, you have to find somewhere to hide, and stay there,” John said. “You can watch but just… do not get involved.”

“Sure.”

Dave was practically untouchable, undetectable when he wanted to be. Even though he was a total dork, it was pretty amazing. All his guns were fitted with silencers. Dave could kill somebody before they’d noticed he was there. It was kind of terrifying. John knew Dave had a brother, but as far as he knew, he’d just disappeared entirely one day – maybe it ran in the family. John really hoped he’d never lose him.

“If something goes wrong –”

“John. Buddy,” Dave said, and then rested a couple fingertips on his sunglasses (without actually lowering them). “I’m not seeing what could possibly go wrong?”

“Are you kidding?” John said, staring at him. It was completely impossible to tell. “Ugh! You are so annoying. If something goes wrong, you should just leave. Try and not let anyone see you.”

“All right, boss.”

“And once everything is over, just kind of sneak out or something. It will probably be fine.”

“I cannot believe you two think this is a good idea,” Karkat said suddenly, having materialised next to John, looking like an angry bird – a little puffed up, somehow. Red in the ears. “What if you fuck it up? Dave –”

“Dude, Karkat, chill out,” Dave said. “This ain’t junior prom. You’re not Egbert’s dad. Not that I’d know anything about the whole dad thing, ha. I promise your lil’ angel won’t come back knocked up. How about that.”

“You are an insufferable little fucker.”

“Maybe that’s why we get on so well.”

“I literally hate you.”

“Guys –” John tried, but it was no use. Karkat had leaned in, palms on the table, so that his face was about an inch from Dave’s

“How come you always wear those fucking stupid glasses?” Karkat frothed. “Are you trying to hide how much of a _dumbass_ you are? Because it’s not working.”

“John, you ought to get a leash for your dog.”

John practically saw the veins in Karkat’s temples explode.

“You’re such a dick!” Karkat squawked. “I’m just trying to make sure you’ll both be safe and you start acting like a – _like a child._ ”

“Like you care about what happens to me,” Dave said, and John grimaced. Did things just get serious? It was really hard to tell. “Remember how you met John? ‘Cause of me?”

“Right, I’m so sure you did that for my benefit,” Karkat snarled. “Remember how you totally fucked me over? Remember how you never fucking apologised?”

Dave didn’t say anything for a few moments. John was blushing, but not nearly as furiously as Karkat – every edge of his face was burning salmon pink. His eyes were wet. John kind of wanted to disappear.

“Listen, that wasn’t about you,” Dave eventually said, really quietly, unnervingly seriously. Karkat turned to leave, but Dave grabbed his wrist. “Karkat, just listen to me for once –”

“I always listen to you! It’s just that you never fucking say anything that makes any sense!” Karkat snapped, wrenching his arm away.

“I knew you deserved better than me,” Dave said. “Okay? And I didn’t even mean to do anything with Terezi.”

Karkat glared at him.

“Besides, all the time you and me were together you were lusting after her like a dog in heat – quit making me look like the bad guy, you asshole,” Dave spat.

This was really, really embarrassing. John had known Dave for a very long time and he had never seen him like this. Equally, he couldn’t force himself to look at Karkat, because the look on his face was impossible.

“We both fucked up. I actually am sorry, okay, about all that shit,” Dave said. “I just never know how to say it without sounding like a douche.”

“Right,” Karkat said. “Well, thanks. Uh, thank you. For apologising. You’re – you’re right, I… I did some bad stuff, too. So, sorry.”

“Great. For the record, I never meant to hurt anybody, I’m just a piece of shit. I’m gonna leave this conversation now,” Dave said, and then pushed himself up from the table. “To go nurse my ego.” And he left the room altogether.

Karkat threw himself down in the seat Dave had just vacated, and stared determinedly at the air slightly to the side of John’s face.

“Hi,” John attempted.

“Hi,” Karkat said. “You okay?”

“Uh, sure. What just happened?”

“I have absolutely no idea,” Karkat said. “Humans are strange, but Dave is… something else.”

“You’re telling me,” John snorted, and then grabbed Karkat’s hand under the table. “I am glad you two are, uh, sorting stuff out. You are both really important to me –”

“Please stop.”

Everyone around here was so emotionally backwards. Still, he was in no position to judge. He knew he had a habit of compartmentalising things. No-one wants to air their dirty laundry.

“How’s Gamzee?” John said, inexpertly changing the subject.

“He feels better, now that Rose and Kanaya are awake,” Karkat said. “Calmer.”

“That’s great.”

“Listen, did Eridan ever say anything to you about him?”

John shook his head. “I don’t think so.”

“Right.”

“I’m sure he won’t try and kick him out,” John said. “He has a heart.”

John squeezed Karkat’s hand a little. It was so small, so warm. He could feel calluses pressing into his fingertips. He was so in love.

“Yeah. I just… I can’t – I know Gamzee. I know he seems weird, or whatever. But he’s a good guy. He just has… problems.”

“Everyone does,” John said. “He saved Rose and Kanaya. He killed those guys who hurt you. It’s obvious how much he cares about everyone. I am not going to let anything happen to him. Or, I mean, any of you.”

Karkat suddenly stood up, then leaned over, grabbed John’s hair, and kissed him hard on the lips. John made a little exclamation into Karkat’s open mouth, and then tilted his head and grabbed a hold of Karkat’s shirt, grinning practically from ear to ear as they kissed.

“Alright, none a’ that,” Eridan said (about half a second after disentangling himself from Sollux). “Bedtime! Get a friggin’ room, all a’ you.”

* * *

John had been sent to bed alone, to wait for Karkat to get Gamzee settled. It took a little while – he didn’t mind. It had been long enough that, when Karkat finally padded in, he must’ve thought John was already asleep. John could hear him tiptoeing around, trying very hard not to make a sound, until he stubbed his toe on the blanket box and swore out loud.

“Hi, Karkat,” John said, stifling his laugh into the pillow right after.

“Fuck, sorry.”

“I wasn’t asleep. Come here,” John said, and Karkat undressed quickly and crawled into bed.

They curled up together, there, two weary battered bodies, burning hot skin against skin, tender. Every touch was so gentle, every inch of Karkat was so soft – and worn – it was like melting. 

“How do you feel so good? You feel _so good_ ,” John mumbled into Karkat’s downy hair, and Karkat pressed his face into John’s chest.

“I love you, John.”

“I love you, too.”

It felt like they’d been through the end of the world, and yet here they still were – all beaten up, but still intact, wounds all closed, bruises fading. John thought they would be all right.

He knew that they would be all right. Someday – someday.


	23. One Step Ahead Of Enemies

**Notes for the Chapter:**

>  **Trigger warnings:** Extreme violence and gore, murder/death, fire, amputation / medical scenes.

“Dave, you have to take them off.”

“I hate this, John. I hate it so much.”

“Dave!” John bleated, furrowing his brow. “You’ve taken them off before!”

“Yeah, like, sometimes… for you…”

“What are you so obsessed with them for, anyway?”

“Oh, you know. Nothing big. Just that my bro who I haven’t seen for – fifteen years? – said that I should always keep ‘em on – you don’t fuck with that kinda shit, you know?”

John sighed, folded his arms. The pair of them stood in John’s apartment, dim-lit by crimson and emerald lanternlight pouring in from the city outside – Christmas Eve, and the Upper City had been bedecked in warm, merry tones; coruscating lights and artificial trees at every street corner, branches weighed down with spun glass ornaments, throwing scattered beams of crystal-bronze light into every corner. It was so beautiful – they were such old customs, the meaning near-lost, but John loved it every year. Meanwhile, Dave was struggling to get into the spirit of things.

“I get that,” John said. “But if someone recognises you, it will be so bad.”

Dave didn’t say anything, just slid his glasses off, folded them, and tucked them into the inside pocket of his suit jacket. John had managed to coerce him into opting for black pinstripes and a plain dark red tie – he looked more subdued than normal, so hopefully people wouldn’t stare at him too much. Of course he still had platinum blonde hair that looked like incandescent light when it caught the lanternlight, and now his flashing scarlet irises were on full display, but nobody would be looking that closely – probably. He was, unfortunately, kind of handsome.

“Ugh, it’s bright in here,” Dave said, squinting and wrinkling his nose.

“You’re kidding? It’ll get worse,” John said, then grinned. “Anyway, how do I look?”

“You look dapper as hell. I am swooning.”

John snorted. He never really liked wearing a suit – he wasn’t so fond of the way the cut of the fabric made him hyper-aware of his body shape. The problem was that he was kind of built, and kind of tall, and he really hated to stand out too much.

“You’re taking this too seriously, John,” Dave said, grabbing him by the shoulders. “It’ll be fun. Who doesn’t love a little public execution? Girls just wanna have fun, dude, and also witness horrific murders. I’m so excited.”

“I know I am talking to a guy who collects dead stuff in jars, but Dave, oh my god.”

“How come y’all are killing her, anyway?”

“I’m not going to kill her! Well, I do not want to anyway,” John said, grimacing. “My boss wants her arm. She has one of those cool mechanical arm things.”

“No way. You know who made it?”

“No… he’s in prison, I think.”

“Oh. That’s real interesting,” Dave said, then pressed his lips together. “So, what, you all are gonna kill her, take her arm, cut off your boss’ arm and just shove that thing all up in there?”

“Uh, I guess so? I don’t know if there is some other protocol for this kind of thing?”

“Radical.”

John broke away, then, to grab a tie and loop it around his neck. As he tied it, a thought occurred to him.

“Dave, are you okay? You know, with all this stuff that keeps happening.”

“It’s not that bad,” Dave said. “Ha, shit, that makes me sound like an asshole. I mean, I know more than you.”

“That also makes you sound like an asshole.”

“We all have a lot of irons in the fire. So, even though everything is fucked to god-damn hell, I think it’s not that bad. I still see a way out, you know?”

“What do you know that I don’t? I thought I figured out a bunch of things,” John said, frowning. “Karkat even told me stuff!”

“Obviously I can’t tell you, for your own safety, otherwise I woulda laid it all on you by now,” Dave said. “Top secret information, dude… if I told you I would straight up have to kill you.”

“No way.”

“Yeah. With my bare hands, and everything. It’d take weeks to get all your gunk out from under my nails.”

“Dave, gross! No,” John said, and then remembered that he was supposed to take concealed weapons – he grabbed a gun and shoved it into a holster he’d tucked inside the waistband of his pants.

“I thought you weren’t gonna kill anyone,” Dave said, and John shrugged.

“I do what I get told to do,” John said, wearily.

“Badass,” Dave said, and elbowed him in the side. When John looked him in the eye, he was actually grinning.

He knew Dave could worm his way out of anything – but John knew he’d miss him like hell if anything ever went wrong.

* * *

They had managed to get past security without even really being questioned – nobody patted John down to check for weapons, nobody stared too intently into Dave’s eyes and got suspicious. They’d been instructed to take their places in the great hall for dinner, so they crossed the entrance hall, passing under marble archways and between columns, through a panelled wooden door that had been propped open.

The hall looked just as John remembered – polished fawn-coloured marble underfoot, walls in walnut panel and slick navy paint that climbed dizzying heights up to the ceiling mural, in sumptuous jewel shades of peach and aubergine, a woman holding an abundance of fruits, a plentiful harvest, bounty for many. Outside lanternlight poured in through circular windows, with complex patterns of panes and gold-plated frames; chandeliers set in the walls coloured the whole room amber and honey, bright and alive, warm, and bubbling. The room had been filled with rows of tables, set for dinner, with deep crimson velvet tablecloths and the finest silverware. It was all very ostentatious – Dave looked completely in his element as the pair of them crossed the room to their designated seats.

Dave pulled out John’s chair first and gestured for him to sit down.

“You are making us look like a couple,” John murmured, but he sat down anyway.

Dave leaned down to breathe in his ear, “So this isn’t a date?”

“Stop it, you asshole!” John hissed, suppressing a laugh. Dave sank into the seat beside him. John cast his eyes around the place setting cards nearby – no names he recognised, so no one he knew would notice that he and Dave were together. This was a relief.

“Wine, sirs?” came the sudden voice of a waiter behind them, and they both nodded; their glasses were filled deeply from a bottle of something old-looking and rich-smelling, and gleaming claret. As the waiter disappeared to serve others who were now filing in, Dave grasped his glass with a fist, inexpertly around the rim, and lifted it to his lips.

“Don’t overdo it,” John said, and Dave smirked.

“John, it’s free. Let’s be real, when is this ever gonna happen to me again?”

With a little grumpy sigh, John grabbed his own glass and clinked it against Dave’s.

“Cheers.”

“Cheers,” Dave said, and then downed half the thing in practically one gulp, like a fish gasping for air.

Before long, all the tables had filled up, starters had been served, and the chatter around them meant that they could converse freely, without fear of being overheard.

“Where’s your boss?”

“Over there. By the far window,” John said, giving a tiny gesture over to the opposite side of the room. Dave nodded, near-imperceptibly.

“Looks like a fun guy.”

“Ha. Sure, Dave. The mayor is over there, at the head of the middle table.”

Dave looked over, and then choked on a mouthful of wine, drawing a couple of stares – John thumped him hard between the shoulderblades, frowning, as purple-tinged spit dribbled down Dave’s chin. He regained his composure pretty quickly, dabbed his face with his napkin, and sat back.

“Interesting.”

“What was that about?” John hissed.

“Her arm… it’s, uh, pretty cool, huh?”

“What an overreaction!” John said, scraping his soup bowl clean with his spoon. He hadn’t had time to sit down to a real meal in what must have been months. “Hey, are you gonna eat that?”

“Nah,” Dave said, and they swapped bowls. “Hey, about that arm…”

“I don’t really know anything about it,” John said. “How come you are so interested?”

“I’m just wondering, you know, where it came from.”

“I told you, dude, I have no idea. My boss just said the guy who made it got arrested – oh, thanks,” John said, flushing as he quickly dropped the line of conversation, because a server had just come to take their bowls away.

“Quit distracting me, Dave,” John snapped, as the waiters walked away. “You might make somebody suspicious.”

“He got arrested?” Dave said immediately, making it abundantly clear that he had not listened to what John just said. “When?”

“Uh, I don’t know. My boss said it was a while ago…”

Dave drank a little more wine (they’d been supplied with table wine now, in elegant carafes that Dave couldn’t seem to get over). Soon after, dinner was served – beautiful porcelain plates stacked high with meat and potato and the crispest, greenest vegetables John had ever known to exist in the subterranean bowels down here. He was utterly blissful, in that moment. They ate, for a little while in quiet, John still casting his gaze around a little fearfully – watching, waiting.

“It certainly is a beautiful piece of technology,” someone said suddenly opposite them, and John bit back a squawk – thankfully, they were just talking to their partner, and hadn’t been listening to Dave earlier. John relaxed back into his seat. The two people across them were turned in their seats, sipping wine and looking over at the mayor.

“How did she come by it? It looks custom.”

“Ah, yes. It’s little known information… only those familiar with his work would have so much as an inkling…”

Dave looked like he was about to interject, so John pinched his thigh hard under the table – he would’ve done something a little less homoerotic, but one hand and his entire mouth was full of complementary bread. Dave jerked, his knee crashing into the underside of the table, but the conversation opposite continued seamlessly.

“I’ve seen it up close, you see, and it’s clear from the wiring. Impossibly delicate, very original. And the choice of metals, too – it’s brass, of course, but here and there plated with gold. The automated firing mechanism of the rifle uses real diamond… it’s certainly a status symbol, something purpose made. But the rumours are that it wasn’t made for her at all.”

“Well, I’d heard she’d stolen it!”

Dave was getting extremely excitable beside John – he was hiding it well, naturally, but it was more than just the wine that was rising in a patchy flush underneath his freckles. He had paused in eating for a moment, still idly picking at a bone to make it look like he wasn’t eavesdropping intensely. John had to admit, he was curious, too.

“I suppose that depends on your definition of ‘steal’, really.”

John shoved an entire roast potato in his mouth, swallowed it almost whole, and listened hard.

“From what I’ve heard, it was made by a human mechanic, for a troll recipient.”

“My god!”

John’s eyes widened, and he grabbed his wine glass to hide behind. He side-eyed Dave, who looked calm and collected, but a little wild in the eyes. They met each other’s stares, and Dave’s expression remained totally inscrutable.

“Well, obviously this fellow was in trouble with the law – dealings with trolls, after all. So the Lamplighters sent a task force out to arrest him. Calliope went, of course. Say, fifteen years ago, by now? She seized the arm, had it transplanted on in the same day, and then she was mayor. It was a terrible scandal.”

“Of course – I remember, but I had no idea…”

“Fifteen years?” John whispered at Dave, staring very keenly.

They were coming to clear the dinnerplates now. In the ensuing disruption, John leaned over to Dave.

“Dude, is there something you want to tell me?”

“Yeah,” Dave said, leaning in deeply, conspiratorially. “It’s… actually, nah.”

“Ugh!” John said, swatting Dave away. He should’ve known he’d never get a straight answer.

“What was the name of the mechanic? It was so long ago, but I remember it being all over the papers…”

“Well, he was involved with the Midnight Crew – a tricky subject, really, as the current administration has tried to wipe away any evidence of their existence… but they were a prolific criminal racket, back in the day. This boy – and he was a boy, of just eighteen or similar – got put away as a cover, a scapegoat if you will, and media attention dipped after that. He was called Dirk. Strider, I believe.”

“ _Holy_ shit,” Dave said, and John grabbed Dave’s wine glass just as he was about to drop it. The two opposite turned to give John a quizzical look, and he grinned sycophantically across.

“Too much wine, I think,” he said, brushing it all aside, and the pair of them offered him a knowing nod, and a smirk. They turned away again.

“I knew he was in prison… I didn’t know – well I think I thought I knew – I mean, who remembers stuff that happened when they were five?” Dave whispered, brow furrowed. He turned to look at John. “Dude, he’s been in prison for _fifteen years_.”

“I heard – but did you listen? He went to prison to cover up for… his friends, I guess?”

“Yeah… shit’s rough,” Dave said simply, grabbing his wine back.

Suddenly, there came the sound of a knife against crystal, ringing out a high note that reflected glassily from the high walls and ceiling. John snatched a glance up at a clock set in the wall behind the mayor’s seat – just about ten o’clock, and right on time, she had stood up. English was seated amongst other Lamplighters, on the other side of the hall – John was to wait for them to make the first move. Dave tensed beside him.

“Wait,” John murmured, and Dave gave a tiny nod. Silence fell.

“Thank you all for attending this evening,” Calliope’s voice rang out, booming to fill the room. John got the impression she really was grateful, and happy to see them all; she was warmer than he remembered. People could really change. “It’s been a delight to meet with old friends. We are of course here to celebrate a successful year, but also, to look to the future.”

“As ever with these sorts of things, I am of course referring to the situation in the Lower City. Recent events have been extremely violent, with petty criminals destroying what looks to be at least a third of the trolls’ territory in an arson attack,” Calliope said. People looked generally confused as to how they were supposed to react.

“I do not think it is appropriate to deal with the trolls in this manner. I have come to believe that, should we leave them alone, they will return us the favour,” she went on. “In fact, I do not think it unjustifiably radical to consider forging trade links with the Lower City.”

Shocked murmurs; appalled faces.

“The fact of the matter is that our civilisation is founded upon that which we wrested from them,” she said, a bitter pill to swallow for many of tonight’s attendees. “There are many who would argue that we owe them nothing. I must disagree.”

“I hope that you won’t all think I have gone soft. In my fifteen years of mayorship, this city has come so far. I promise you, Darkhaven’s best interests are at the core of everything I do.”

Someone else stood up, suddenly, with a scrape of chairlegs. John, along with the rest of the room, snapped his head in the direction of the sound, his heart jumping up into his throat in earnest.

“Your pathetic reign is over,” English boomed, and with a flash of gunpowder, one of the Lamplighters by his side assassinated Calliope with a single shot to the head. She crashed to the ground, dead weight, before she’d even had time to lift her arm.

“Now is a good time to hide!” John said, and his instruction was understood by Dave, even though it was swallowed by the ensuing pandemonium.

English and the Lamplighters had flipped the table that they all sat at, so that the whole thing erupted into flames from the candles. Bullets were pinging left and right – how many people had brought weapons?! – John drew his gun, jumped his table and sprinted over to English, dodging revellers drunk and terrified in equal measure.

“John. Go to her body. Protect it!” English roared at him, shooting someone dead directly over John’s left shoulder. John nodded, and then sprinted over to where some five separate people were attending Calliope’s body.

 

“Excuse me!” John bellowed, over the cacophony of roaring flame, bullets flying and people screaming – pain and fear. “I’m a Lamplighter, please unhand the mayor –”

Someone lunged up at him and grabbed hold of the barrel of his gun – John shot it, burning their hand to hell and just clipping the meat of their calf – they screamed, this horrible desperate sound that would be lodged in John’s brain forever like a splinter, and they broke away. John leaned down, clasped the mayor under her arms – still warm. As he moved her, fresh blood leaked out of her head. This was gruesome. He dragged her a few paces away, gun and sight pointed behind him at a small gaggle of terrified, unarmed people. As soon as he could, he shoved his back up against the wall, stared down his gun, and held Calliope like some ghastly, spent hostage.

“I won’t shoot,” he said. “Just stay away. Get out of here.”

They dispersed, and John watched the chaos unfolding from his own relatively privileged vantagepoint. The floor was becoming increasingly slick with spilled blood; people were brawling indiscriminately, smashed bottles used as impromptu weapons – the hail of bullets was slowing as people ran low on ammunition, but the sickening crack of broken bones and the roar of flame supplemented the horrible cacophony as people turned to more traditional combat methods in the wake of this atrocious, unspeakable tragedy. The pleasant smell of food and wine in the air had become tainted with wave upon wave of acrid coppery blood, and smoke, and cauterised hot flesh.

John suddenly caught sight of a head of bright white hair, and his eyes widened in terror. Then he realised what Dave was doing. Someone had got him in a headlock, and Dave was just letting the guy punch him in the face, over and over. John couldn’t move, he had to look after Calliope – but what the fuck was going on? The guy tossed Dave aside like a sack of wet laundry; Dave staggered, and then righted himself, just in time to get a bottle to the face. And then he just laughed, through a split lip, through sheets of blood hailing down his face.

Two seconds after that, the space that Dave had just been occupying was completely empty. His assailant looked confused, and then John couldn’t see him anymore as he was obscured by another pair of brawlers. Dave had just let himself get horribly assaulted. All that time he’d been saying he was fine – of course he wasn’t. He was losing it, just like the rest of them!

English staggered over to John, a revolver clutched in each bloody fist. He was flanked by a modest group of Lamplighters, all armed, watching their backs – protecting their boss.

“Excellent,” English said. “This is more mess. Than I had anticipated.”

As English barked with laughter, John could see that one of his teeth had been knocked out, and deep red blood poured down his chin.

“I need the arm. The people need. A real leader.”

“Did you bring a doctor?” John said, suddenly more curious than anything. 

“Obviously, John,” English said, looking surprisingly chipper, not like his usual self – like publicly assassinating his sister was the best thing that had ever happened to him. One of the Lamplighters beside him stepped up and gave John a cursory nod. John recognised him from the infirmary.

“I’ve done field amputations before,” the Lamplighter said, and then grimaced. “It’s never pretty. But I’d say I’m quite skilled.”

“John. You will stop any interferers,” English said, and John nodded.

“I’ll use a local anaesthetic only,” said the doctor, and then he reached into a satchel at his side, withdrew a huge syringe with a wide-gauge needle, and John grimaced. Did he really want to watch this? He glanced upward, only to spy a flash of ruby red peeking out from behind a curtain; two jewels on a reddish canvas. He’d only noticed Dave because Dave wanted to make sure John knew he was still there. He was so smart. John hoped he enjoyed the show.

English tugged off his jacket and shirt, and groaned as the huge needle popped into his left shoulder. John jostled Calliope under his arm, trigger finger still ready to shoot anybody who tried to interfere. The rest of the Lamplighters had formed a circle around them, shielding them to all prying eyes – save for Dave’s.

The doctor took a scalpel and, without hesitation, plunged it right into English’s shoulder. Fresh blood welled up and started pouring down, and English looked completely disaffected – kind of relaxed, even. Once the skin had been split all the way around, the doctor took to carefully poking around inside the wound with his fingers.

“I’m making sure that there’s enough muscle left to support the prosthesis,” the doctor explained, and John nodded grimly. It was kind of interesting – kind of gross and unreal. “Also he’ll need enough padding for his shoulder bone.”

“I see,” John said, frowning deeply. There was so much blood. English, understandably, wasn’t looking, instead grinning sickly up at John.

The doctor was carving English up like a piece of meat; now he’d peeled away a part of his upper arm so that he had space to sew up the nerve bundles and ligate the blood vessels. He worked admirably quickly. John was surprised that he hadn’t fainted at all this blood and violence. In the background, the screaming rage went on. One of their number fired their gun, and the spent canister clinked to the marble, and rolled. John shuddered.

Then the doctor retrieved a _hacksaw_ from his bag, and John looked away, because that was just a step too far. For the next ten minutes he endured the sound of English’s arm bone being sawn through, while occasionally popping bullets in the legs of people who got a little too close. Then came a dull thwack as the arm hit the ground, and the gristly sound of the bone stump being sanded down.

John lay Calliope down – she wasn’t warm anymore, and had gone very pale. This was inhuman.

“Can you retrieve the arm?” the doctor said, and John grimaced. He didn’t want to have to take off her shirt and stuff… that was kind of wrong, especially because her expression of shock had since faded, and now she looked almost content. Only a little blood had leaked into her hair, cutting a horrible contrast against her soft white curls. John hunkered down beside her and removed his own jacket, draping it over her. He reached underneath it to unbutton her shirt and unfasten the harness holding her arm in place, then handed it across to the medic before buttoning Calliope’s shirt up again. She didn’t need to be humiliated like that – there had to be some scant amount of humanity left amongst them, even if John carried it all.

English’s stump had been sewn shut – rather expertly, actually. The medic fastened the leather straps of the arm around Worgan’s chest and over his other shoulder.

“I don’t know how these things work, exactly. It’s some alchemical mechanism that responds to your brain, or something,” the doctor said, wiping the sweat from his forehead. “Just try wriggling your fingers.”

English did, and then grinned, completely delighted. He put back on his own shirt, buttoned it, and stood up, claiming the puddle of his own blood he’d just been wallowing in.

“All of you!” English cried out, firing a single shot from the rifle in his arm at the ceiling. It struck the lady in the mural right in her forehead. The Lamplighters in front of him parted, to reveal a scene of ebbing chaos. Most people were dead or unconscious.

“Leave this place. From now on. You will answer to me,” English said, grinning as he flexed his new arm.

* * *

He hadn’t seen Karkat since he’d last been at Eridan’s, about two weeks ago, and he was just so desperate at this point that he didn’t even stop for a nap, or to change out of his blood-drenched suit – his white shirt was irreparably stained crimson that was now turning black, and the grey pinstripe of his jacket was blotched with somebody else’s blood. Probably Calliope’s, but there had been all sorts on the floor. For once, though, it wasn’t his own – so that was something.

He’d made his way down into the underground tunnels, remembering that one or two of the entrances had been left open… but he was so sleep-deprived, like a dead man walking, he had no recollection of how to find them.

“Bec?” John attempted, but wherever Bec was, he wasn’t listening. “Jaspers?” Nope. “Darn it.”

After about an hour of wandering around in circles, getting increasingly sick of being conscious, John finally found a manhole that would let him push it open. Once he was above ground, he vaguely knew his way around – and he picked his way across the wreckage to Eridan’s.

He didn’t have a door key, he realised, standing on Eridan’s porch. It couldn’t have been later than five in the morning; who was going to be awake to let him in? He grabbed the heavy brass knocker and tried it anyway, because who knew. To his extreme surprise, after a few moments, someone swung the door open – Aradia, wearing a silky nightdress and looking harassed, and exhausted.

“Oh my goodness,” she squeaked, desperately trying to keep her voice down. “Are you hurt? You look awful – come in.”

She ushered him inside, clicking the door behind them. John just pressed a finger to his lips and _shh_ ed.

“Not hurt. Going to bed. See you later.”

“Alright. Goodnight, John,” Aradia said, giving him a little wink as she padded away to her bedroom. John tiptoed up the stairs, trying his best not to let them creak.

Just before he went to Karkat’s room, he listened hard at the keyhole of Dave and Terezi’s room – he could hear Dave snoring. That was good. So he turned and pushed open the door of Karkat’s room, letting a shaft of yellow light spill and mingle with the chocolate hues coming in from the window. He closed the door near-silently behind him, let his damp, sickly-sweet clothes fall to the floor, and crept across the room. He slipped into bed. He sagged the mattress so much under his exhausted, leaden weight that Karkat stirred.

“Who?” Karkat mumbled, half-asleep, and John lay one big hand on him, cupping his back.

“Me,” John said back, and Karkat grumbled happily.

“Christmas.”

“I know. It is super early though. Like, so early. You… sleep.”

“You. You are sleep.” Karkat stirred. “…You stink of blood. What happened?!”

“Karkat, please… not now… I’m so tired.”

“What the fuck – John – are you okay?!” Karkat barked, not over-loudly, and shot up in bed, groping around in the dark to flick on the incandescent lamp at the bedside. “Are you hurt?”

“Not hurt,” John said, wincing in the bright light. “Mayor’s Christmas party. Everybody died. Blood everywhere. I am so tired.”

“Oh,” Karkat said, relaxing a little. “Did it go to plan?”

“Yes. Boss is mayor now,” John said, rolling over to shove his face into the pillow. Karkat flicked the lamp off again and lay down beside him, curling around him, every inch of them that touched alight with blissful warmth. John felt peace, a happiness he never thought he might reach ‘til now.

“I don’t know what to think,” Karkat said, trying to sound impassive, but it came out so desperate. Obviously, none of them were safe. Obviously, there was still every chance that something could go horribly wrong. But John had it all under control.

“I’m gonna… close eye. Keep close eye. Know what he’s up to. Nothing bad happen… gonna happen… without you all knowing… promise. Promise.”

He felt warm breath on his ear, then hot little lips close around the shell of it. The tiniest imperceptible whisper: “I love you.”

“I love you, I love you. Love you. Karkat.”

Karkat pressed his face into John’s neck, and it must’ve been horrible, the blood stench, but Karkat held him all the same.


	24. Down To The End

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hello again old friends. If you are a returning reader, some relatively minor plot aspects have changed. I will post them at the end of this chapter so you can catch up if you don't want to re-read.

All of them woke to the sound of screaming.

Karkat barrelled upright first, yelping out loud in sympathy, before launching himself sideways, tangling his legs in a sheet, and landing hard on his face on the floor with a dull slap.

“Fuck!” he snarled from the floor, voice full of grit – John had already leapt to his feet, checked the clock – seven thirty in the morning, too early for this bullshit – he crossed the dim room in a couple of strides, paused to put on underwear and then flung the door open, bursting into the landing.

Karkat was half a second behind him, swaddled in his sheet still; the screaming had abated, and half the doors on the corridor were open; Rose sprinted by, right into Dave’s room. John and Karkat followed.

Dave and Terezi were sitting on the four poster bed, sheets thrown aside, Terezi panting, her red eyes flashing. Rose was at their bedside, along with Eridan and Sollux. Terezi collected herself for a second, and took a sharp breath.

“What happened to you?!” she shrieked, and her chest heaved. “You stink of blood! Gross!”

“Nothing happened,” Dave said coolly, reaching to the bedside table to grab his glasses. Rose slapped them right out of his hands; Dave flexed his empty fingers, face totally impassive. John let out a breath of sweet relief: it was fine, nothing new had gone wrong. Terezi had woken to the stench of Dave’s blood, from the wounds he’d gathered last night at the party. Everyone was as safe as he’d left them.

Amusingly, everyone was also in their underwear. 

“What the hell?” Karkat bleated exhaustedly.

“John, you let this happen to him?” Rose said, clutching her breasts with one arm, the other hand gesturing furiously at Dave. If she was embarrassed at all, she certainly wasn’t showing it. Sollux tossed a t-shirt from the floor over to her. She pulled it on – it was at least three sizes too big for her, so she looked like a tiny, angry, sleep-deprived child. “Look at him!”

Dave looked alright, John thought. He had two black eyes, fine, and an open, jagged wound over most of his left cheek and jaw, splitting the corner of his lip. As he hadn’t had any treatment for it thus far, it was all gummed up with dried blood thick as molasses. It had been torn open again where his face had been stuck to the pillow overnight – there was an enormous, tacky crimson stain where he’d been lying.

“More laundry,” Sollux lamented.

“John!” Rose and Karkat snapped at the same time, and John groaned.

“What happened?” Eridan needled, in this kind of exhausted-but-still-whiny voice, and Dave put his bloodied face in his hands.

“Listen, everything is fine!” John insisted. Terezi was glaring at him like she wanted to rip off his head. “Everything went to plan – almost everything. There was a _huge_ fight. Dave got caught up in it for a few minutes.”

“What happened to _you?_ ” Eridan said, looking John up and down. Karkat prickled beside him. John glanced down at his bare skin, only to remember that he’d gotten soaked in God-only-knew how many strangers’ blood last night. He was all smeared in cracked and flaking deep red, but he didn’t have a fresh wound on him – just old bruises, old scars. Old bullet wounds. The usual.

“This is not my blood,” John said. “I didn’t get back ‘til like five in the morning or something. I have to shower, I get it. Thanks, Eridan.”

Eridan just smirked at him. 

“Happy Christmas,” he said. John faltered, and then gave up a little smile.

* * *

John had showered – and rinsed down the shower twice to get the blood out – and the house had mostly fallen quiet again. Many people had returned to bed; instead, John padded downstairs, seeking out the sound of pots and pans clattering. Something was afoot, and he wanted to know what. He’d dressed himself: dark jeans and a grey sweater he’d stolen from Karkat’s meagre remaining stash of belongings.

“That isn’t very festive,” Kanaya interrupted him on the stairs. Even though both of her arms were in slings, and she was just half-dressed she still looked astonishing – that didn’t seem fair. She wore an emerald green silk slip, with a loose black cardigan sweater draped over the top; her waist was wreathed in real mistletoe, which someone had pinned to her clothes. Offsetting this distinguished look was an enormous garland of fat golden tinsel that had been strung around her neck and her horns.

“Ah – sorry,” John said, flushing.

“Please, feel free to remove this outlandish thing,” Kanaya said, casting her eyes to the trail of papery gold hanging down to her chest. “Rose finds it amusing. I must say I disagree.”

“Right,” John said, trying his best not to laugh as he un-strung the tinsel from Kanaya and wrapped it around his own neck.

“That is much more fitting,” she said, and afforded him a little smile. Someone had painted her lips black, drawn sharp wings of kohl around her eyes. Even in these dire times she kept her unflappable dignity. “Karkat and Eridan are in the kitchen. Apparently, we will be having a banquet.”

“A banquet? No way. Do you guys even have any food?”

“Go and see for yourself,” Kanaya said slyly, and then nodded to him and disappeared up the stairs.

John adjusted his tinsel scarf and went on, crossing the hallway into the kitchen. Dave was leaning in the doorway, observing the events therein.

In the centre of the kitchen, Karkat stood with his palms pressed against his eyesockets. His whole face was ruddy red like a perfect Christmas ornament. John started forwards, but Dave put an arm out to stop him.

“Wait.”

Eridan stood with his back to Karkat, leaning against the counter.

“If you don’t like how I do it, why don’t you do it yourself, you fucking asshole?!” Karkat seethed, now gesticulating wildly. John could see that his bright yellow eyes were ringed red. 

“Chopping potatoes,” Dave filled in, and John nodded, a little slack-jawed.

“I told you how to do it, _Karkat_ ,” Eridan replied, apparently forcing his voice to stay level.

“You said to cut them! You didn’t say – fucking – length-ways or whatever – why does it even matter?” Karkat squawked, tears spilling down his face now. Behind him, on the kitchen table, was a pile of potatoes, half-chopped, and a knife that had, apparently, been stabbed into the wooden tabletop in frustration.

“Um,” John said, and Dave nodded, folding his arms.

“Look, if you don’t want to help, just get out and find Sollux or somethin’ –”

“I do want to help!” Karkat said. “I wanted to help. I wanted this to be nice for everybody. But then you had to start being an egotistical piece of shit, thinking you’re the only one who knows how to cut a fucking potato –”

“Don’t shit talk me, Karkat. You’d be dead if I –”

“I am aware of that! That doesn’t mean you need to be a shithead – fuck you!” Karkat spat, and hurled a potato at the back of Eridan’s head. It hit him square and split into halves. Eridan howled in pain, whirling around, clutching the back of his head.

“You little fucker!” he snarled, and then saw that Karkat was shaking with rage, crying out loud, fat tears dripping from his face like crystals. And then, Eridan’s expression totally softened.

“I don’t want to fight,” Karkat said, wiping off his tears. “You’re being a dick. It’s fucking Christmas. We could die any day. And you’re being a dick.”

Eridan took a deep, measured breath. John almost started forwards again, but somehow he could tell they would figure it out. Beside him, Dave hadn’t budged. John looked again only to realise Dave was wearing a neon red sweater with a reindeer knitted into it.

“Dude, is that yours?”

“Quiet.”

“You’re right,” Eridan conceded, with a long sigh. “Sorry. I – I’m worried, too, about all a’ this. I shouldn’t be mean. It doesn’t matter which way you cut ‘em. Do ‘em whatever way makes you happy.”

Karkat huffed a little sigh of relief, turned on his heel, and wrenched the knife out of the tabletop.

“Are you two gonna stand there all day?” Eridan snapped, and John started, shook his head, and dashed into the kitchen. Dave was close behind.

The counters were decked in half-prepared food; John squatted down to see that the oven cradled an enormous bird – who knew how they’d come by that – there was a vast cast iron heating cranberries on the stove, with orange and cinnamon, belching out fat clouds of delicious steam. Eridan tended to carrots, Karkat potatoes, and Dave had seized upon a pack of eggs and was beating them into eggnog.

“John,” Eridan said, gesturing to an enormous pumpkin. “Pie.”

“Right,” John said with a grimace. He hated sweets. Nonetheless, he pushed his sleeves up to his elbows, and got to work.

* * *

Later in the day, after they had all had their fill of food and most had fallen asleep from over-consumption, John bundled himself into a thick peacoat and headed into the city. Christmas Day wasn’t a time to be alone, he thought – while the others could cope without him for a few hours, Jade was by herself in a cramped jail cell with no one to talk to. It was a simple matter to charm the prison guard on duty; John was all rosy cheeks and wrapped in tinsel, just trying to see his good friend for a while. It was the holidays, after all, but it hardly looked like it in the narrow, forbidding staircases and corridors that led to Jade’s cell. The stone parquets underfoot were so thick with dirt that the detail was barely visible under the sputtering gaslamps; the ceiling seemed ever to bear down on him, as though waiting to drop and consume him entirely.

He was led along briskly by the guard, but nevertheless John gave brief pause occasionally outside some prisoner’s cell – they all were labelled with just a brass plaque bearing a number. Briefly, he was tantalised by the thought that Dave’s elder brother could be behind any one of these doors… that he might find familiar neon eyes flashing through an open hatch. But they were all closed, and mostly quiet within. It was a foolish hope, he knew, but that he was in the same building as another Strider gave him a little tremor all the same.

Eventually, he and the prison guard reached Jade’s cell, and the guard unlocked the door and shoved it open. He gestured for John to go in, so he did, and it slammed heavily behind him. There was a scrape as the lock slid back into position. John then became aware that Jade was slumped in bed, her long hair waterfalling from the edge, her chest heaving with dry sobs. John crossed the room in a second and knelt in front of her.

“Jade,” he said, voice cracking. “I’m here. I came for Christmas.”

He sought out one of her little hands, to find that she clutched a piece of paper with white knuckles. He eased it from her grip, now stroking her hair with the other hand. Jade wiped her face of its tears, and pushed herself up to sit. John took a place beside her on the bed, put one arm around her, and squeezed her gently into his side. Then he glanced down at the piece of paper, and read just the last paragraph.

_ i THINK THAT SOME BAD STUFF IS GONNA HAPPEN SOON, aND I ALSO KNOW THAT I’M NOT THAT STRONG, nOT LIKE JOHN OR EQUIUS OR GAMZEE, aND I JUST WANTED TO TELL YOU THAT THINGS ARE GETTING WORSE HERE. tHERE’S A CHANCE I MIGHT NOT MAKE IT TO SEE YOU AGAIN,_  
_ sO IF I DON'T, wHAT'S IMPORTANT IS THAT, i LOVE YOU, a LOT,_  
_ hAHA, bUT I GUESS, iM JUST BEING MELODRAMATIC_

A lump formed in John’s throat that he couldn’t swallow. He couldn’t think of anything to tell her – what was there left to say? Tavros should still have been with them, and it wasn’t fair. John allowed himself a few moments of self-pity: it hurt. That he’d had to shoot his friend, that the situation was so unbearable… it wasn’t that he wanted to give up, not yet, but every day became only bleaker.

“John,” Jade said quietly, her throat cracking, and John startled at the noise. “I need to tell you something.”

“What? What is it?” John said, voice as soft and soothing as possible, tightening his arm around her shoulders. He smoothed down her curtain of hair on instinct – that was what always calmed her down when they were younger, she loved it when he teased out her tangles – and tucked a strand behind the tiny shell of her ear.

“This isn’t,” she said, and then hiccupped. “This can’t have a happy ending.”

John’s heart plummeted through his chest wall.

“How can you be sure?” he said, ready to bargain whatever it took. His life?

“I – I just have a feeling.”

He never doubted Jade’s feelings. They were always right. But this time… he didn’t want to believe her. It couldn’t be right. All of them had given up so much, and tried so hard. If Tavros had to die, then John at least wanted to make sure it wasn’t in vain – it was some cruel twist of fate if they were all doomed in the end anyway.

“I know it sounds silly! But… I’ve never been wrong before. I wish I was,” she said, scrubbing at her eyes with a fist.

“Okay, listen,” John said softly, and Jade tilted her head to nuzzle closer into his neck. “I get that things aren’t going to be… perfect. And bad stuff is gonna happen.”

He faltered, and heat rose in his throat.

“But – there must be something I can do,” he said, clipping his voice to an urgent whisper to keep the guard outside from hearing. “Jade. Please tell me there is something I can do.”

“You’ve done so much already, John,” Jade said, and John felt her tears as they streamed down his neck. “How much more can you give?”

“I would do anything,” John said, and then took a little gasping breath to keep himself from crying. “I would do anything for you.”

All of them were going to get out of this alive. From the beginning, he’d never even entertained any other possibility. And he was not prepared to think that he might have been wrong, because to do that would mean to admit that he had been an idiot all along, and everyone he cared about was going to get badly, irreparably hurt.

“Please don’t tell me that I don’t have what it takes to fix this,” John said firmly, and Jade tensed horribly beside him. 

“There’s too much outside of your control,” Jade said.

“I know that – I – I already know that,” John admitted. “But no one else is going to die. Not before I think of a better plan.”

“Something horrible is coming, and… John, there isn’t anything you can do about it,” Jade said, and frustration swelled in him like a furious bull rearing.

“No one else is going to die. I am not kidding around, Jade. I don’t care what I have to do,” he insisted. “You are gonna have to re-calculate, or whatever.”

At this, Jade gave a tiny laugh – a little desperate one, which ended on a sob and hiccup.

“Okay, then. A catastrophe is coming, and the only thing you can do is control the damage,” she said. “You need to make sure everyone is safe.”

“Of course I will! No matter what happens. I’ll do everything I can.”

“It’s going to be so dangerous. I think you’re so brave, John, and so stupid.”

“I know. But I feel like there is nothing else I can do now besides give it my all, you know?” he said, and then sighed. “I don’t have anybody besides you guys. I don’t want anybody else. I just want all of you to be safe.”

“Please make sure… that you make it out, too.”

John hesitated at this. He hadn’t put much stock in his own life before now. Whatever it was that made soldiers throw themselves into battle without fear of consequence – he had that. Some singular disregard for his own individuality: he didn’t matter. But, finally, he had realised: John did fear death, terribly, and there was nothing he wanted more than to lie down beside Karkat, or sit with all of his friends, in a world that was no danger to them. Yes, he was going to make it out alive, and he was going to pull his friends out of this horrible pit too.

“I promise. Lamplighter’s honor, or whatever.”

* * *

A few days later, John found himself again at English’s side – kneeling on the floor, scrubbing the hardwood floors of the mayoral mansion, trying to clean up blood that had long since gone putrid and tar-like. English, the man himself, was standing over him, arms crossed, that new brass one whirring and gleaming impressively.

“I hope that you do not find. This work to be beneath you,” English said, and John thought it was probably a joke. “I want this place to be clean. By New Year’s Eve.”

“It’s no problem, boss” John said, as chipper as he could be with his knees worn down to the bone and his body aching all over from scrubbing all day like Cinderella. His hands were tainted pink with the stain of someone else’s blood.

“I have many. Exciting announcements. To make on that date,” English said.

John didn’t so much as imperceptibly wince, but he did curse inwardly. He had wanted to spend New Year’s with Karkat and the others. Seemed like that plan had just died a death.

* * *

“I can’t be here for New Year’s,” John sighed. A few of them were huddled together around the fire in Eridan’s living room; John sat in an armchair facing the flames, while Feferi luxuriated on a chaise longue with her head in Eridan’s lap.

“What? Why not?” Vriska said, staring across at him from her seat on the floor beside the fire. Karkat looked tired, but nonetheless fixed him with an interrogating stare, from the armchair beside his own.

“My boss is planning something. I need to be there,” John said, and huffed. “There’s something else you should know.”

Eridan’s hands stalled from where he was threading fabric flowers into Feferi’s hair. She lifted her head, too, sending a bundle of silk hyacinth floating to the floor.

“Tell me this ain’t bad news,” he said, half-trying to joke but John and everybody else in the room caught the desperation.

“I’m sorry,” he said. “I went to see Jade.”

Eridan’s eyes went wide. “What did she – John?”

“She said… she said that, uh. That she has a feeling this isn’t going to end well,” John said, and then quickly followed up with, “But she doesn’t think anyone is going to die.” This sequence of sentences made Eridan’s facial expression do a complete three hundred and sixty in the space of half a second, which was a sight to see. Now he was grinning, if a little exhaustedly.

“Well, let’s wait for new year,” Eridan said. “Maybe your boss will change his mind about all a us.”

“But probably not,” Karkat sighed. “That guy is fucking weird.”

“Yes,” Vriska said, and then frowned. A little silence followed.

“I want to ask a question. Please tell me the truth,” John said. Nobody said anything, but all of their yellowy eyes fixed him with a warning look. John gulped. “I know about… Jake. How is he related to my boss?”

Eridan, Feferi and Karkat all swivelled their heads to stare at Vriska, but nobody told her not to speak. Vriska threw her head back and sighed, and then looked back at John with her one blazing eye.

“They met once, in a shoot-out,” Vriska said, looking very much as though she was choosing her words carefully. “Jake is a crack shot and left Caliborn permanently disfigured. I guess your boss decided that taking Jake’s name would somehow make his humiliating defeat okay?”

“So, they’re not really related at all?” John said, brow furrowed.

“No. But they are obsessed with each other,” Vriska said, and then she grinned, because John was on the edge of his seat by now. “I miss Jake.”

“Do you think we’ll ever see him again?” Karkat said, with a pained look on his face.

“He knows he’s supposed to be lying low,” Feferi said sternly, and the other three sighed. She went on. “He hasn’t read any of the letters we sent for him with Jaspers.”

“He helped me, back when I was in trouble,” John said. “I wanted to thank him for that, but.”

“It’s better if you don’t get involved with any of – uh, with him,” Vriska said, looking askance at Eridan and grinning apologetically. “He always turns up when you need him. Eventually. ‘Til then, we have you.”

“Thanks, Vriska,” John said, and she gave him an unnervingly real, warm smile.

* * *

“Karkat, I really have to go,” John said, and he sighed. He and Karkat were both standing in the hallway of Eridan’s house. It was December 31st, John was due at his boss’ manor to hear his announcements and figure out how he could keep his friends safe for another year – or, maybe, a month, at least. Karkat had a vice grip on his wrist, and was frowning. John wondered briefly why he’d always thought that being diminutive, Karkat ought to be weak and sensitive and yield to him. In fact, nobody was tougher or more stubborn.

“Every time you leave, I get worried that you’re not coming back again,” Karkat said, tightening his grip.

“I’m not going anywhere dangerous,” John said, trying to soothe him while also a little anxious that he was going to be late. “It’s just my boss, he has some announcements to make. I have to go to find out what we should do next.”

John tried to pull his hand away, but Karkat held it ever tighter, dragging him closer, pinning him with those moony eyes.

“What if you just stay here?” Karkat suggested, a little desperate, as if that could actually work. “What if you just dropped out and stayed with us?”

How he wished he could. John considered this for a moment, staring tenderly at Karkat’s grim, determined face; the set of his jaw, the furl of his unhappy scowl, the tiny tiny points of his canines just peeping out. John felt stronger just from knowing that he had to make sure Karkat was safe.

“You know I can’t do that,” John said, and finally wrenched his arm away, swatting Karkat’s hands away when he tried to grab John by the shoulders. “I’m trying to help you, okay? I swear I’ll come back as soon as I can.”

“You better not have a single fucking scratch on you when you come back,” Karkat growled, and then ran a hand through his hair in exasperation. “But you will come back.”

“I’ll always come back, Karkat,” John said, and Karkat seemed to soften a little. “But for now, I have to go.”

And before Karkat could protest further, John had gently but firmly pushed him back, and slipped out the front door, onto the street. Familiar sights waited there for him: streets seeping with dirty water, broken glass crunching jarringly underfoot, the acrid smell of smoke still stuck in the air, most doors and windows boarded up and the few faces that he saw were hastily hidden and distrusting.

John felt it, too, the sense that their luck was dwindling. With each day, it became increasingly difficult to leave Karkat behind, but he was duty-bound to protect them. He loped down the street, hunting out one of the last remaining entrances to the subterranean passages. After a time, he found a manhole cover that was ever so slightly ajar, so that he could flip it – with a little effort. He was getting out of shape, going hungry on several nights just to make sure that Karkat and the others had enough to eat. They had done well over Christmas, but visiting smugglers were few now, and reluctant, their trade routes mostly closed off and the threats from Lord English dire and prolific. John heaved himself down the ladder and into the tunnel.

He took off at a brisk pace, still caught in his thoughts, hands shoved in his pockets to beat the bitter cold. His breath fogged before him. English had already placed a gag on the media, conspiring with the newspaper magnates to ensure that he was portrayed in a positive light –smart, captivating, powerful, with an iron fist. John had to wonder what role their fates had to play in all of this, if there even was such a thing. If he had warned Calliope, somehow – if he had told her of the grave danger her brother posed – would she have believed him? Would English have gone ahead with the plan anyway? John thought so, but he felt like a coward all the same.

Those few lamps that still puttered out a faithful buzz were flickering and dying, down here, with not even crooks to tend them. John lit the lantern that hung forever at his belt, which threw out a hot halo of light that gave him a little comfort. More than anything he wanted to lie down, now, with Karkat, somewhere where nobody wanted to hurt them. 

Maybe he could assassinate English alone? John faltered, though. This Jake that the others knew, he was supposedly a champion marksman. And even he hadn’t managed to take down Lord English – only impressed him to the point that he had stolen his name, perhaps out of mockery. John was far less of a crack shot. He was soft.

After a time, John realised he was close enough to the mansion, and so he scrambled up ladder rungs set in the tunnel wall, and emerged into a side alley in the Athenaeum. Nobody saw him, of course: he had this process down to a fine art, by now. Suddenly he saw how easy it could be to disappear in this city, and thought of Roxy, and Jake, and especially of Jane, and he hoped against hope that they were somewhere safe – together? – plotting their epic rescue. Because, as John was beginning to accept, they, and not he, were their best hope.

The path up to English’s manor was delineated by Lamplighters standing on guard, their lanterns all blaring faithfully at their sides, each of them wielding a rifle and bayonet. John nervously polished the nametag on his jacket with an idle thumb as he strode past them, feeling a little strange with all their eyes on him. English had whipped them into shape in little time at all. Finally, he stepped through the grand entrance doors that had been swung open for guests, and passed into the manor.

Under Calliope, it had been warm here, and convivial. Things, John quickly noticed, were different now. Most of the old paintings and furniture had been stripped away, leaving just bare and utilitarian space. Above the door into the hall hung an enormous portrait of Lord English himself, looking like it was barely dry before it was put up because the English in the picture featured the new arm wrested from his sister. John felt his skin crawl under the impassive, painted stare of his boss, and he headed into the hall just to feel like he was escaping surveillance.

Somebody had set up rows and rows of chairs, all facing towards a pulpit at the far side of the room. Most of the chairs were already occupied, and nobody took notice of John as he pulled up a chair near the back and sheepishly took a seat. He would’ve preferred to be early, but Karkat… John forced that thought away, and looked up and around. He realised that the mural of the lady on the ceiling had been painted over, her face and breast censored by viscous black paint. He grimaced, and inspected the audience around him; they were pale and nervous with fervent excitement.

Shortly, Lord English appeared, and the thrilled chatter in the room came to an abrupt stop. He ascended the steps to the pulpit, and he stood there, admiring them all. He looked worse than usual; tired, gaunt, pallid. Recovering from his procedure was, clearly, sapping much of his energy. 

“It is good. That all of you. Are here,” English boomed. His voice echoed around the cavernous room, so empty even with all of them there, now that Calliope’s belongings had been trashed and likely burned. English idly flexed his ill-begotten arm. “I have. New plans. That I am sure will please you all.”

A wave of nervous energy rippled through the room. Most of the Lamplighters were, by now, antsy and anxious and braying for blood. John could tell.

“No longer will we be tempered. By my sister’s misguided ideals,” English drawled. “Nor her insistence. On justice for the trolls. Who deserve no such thing.”

John suddenly realised that he was afraid of an unmoderated Lord English. He swallowed to soothe his dry throat and hoped that his flitting heart might slow soon.

“Soon. We will mount an assault,” English said, and John’s heart bounded into his throat, and his eyes widened. “We will sack the Lower City. We will kill those who refuse to co-operate. And enslave those that come quietly.”

Oh, no. No, no, no. John immediately thought of Karkat, and imagined how remote a possibility that he would agree to go quietly. He was doomed. John resisted the urge to leap out of his seat and sprint the miles back to Eridan’s house, to lock and secret them all away so that they would be safe, so that the onslaught would pass them by altogether. Many of the other Lamplighters were now leaned in or on the edges of their seats, prickling with nervous energy, and, John thought he could tell, the burning urge to kill.

“Their existence. Is a continued embarrassment to us,” English said. “But worse. Are those amongst our ranks. Who would consort with them. And assist them.”

John felt himself the blood rush from his face and the cold sweat creeping on, but it seemed like no one was looking at him. English’s expression was impenetrable, especially from this distance.

“As some of you are aware. One of our number was under the misapprehension. That she could pass weapons to trolls. And evade a bloody death,” English said, growling towards the end, and John bit down on the inside of his cheek as hard as he could to keep back his whimper. There was a small commotion in the front row – two Lamplighters dragged forwards a third, who was wearing a hood over her head. They turned, to face the crowds. The pair of them glowed with sick, ill-won authority.

English descended from the pulpit. John needed to do something, but what was there to do?

“But look. She was wrong,” English said, and his face contorted with unadulterated hatred. “I have. The girl.” He turned, ripped the hood from his captive’s head, and revealed Jane standing there, her face bloodied, bruised, and deathly pale. Shit!

“Let me be very clear. If you follow the rules. You will be rewarded,” English warned them all. “But if you undermine. My authority. You will die like this.”

John screamed internally. English couldn’t kill his last family. He couldn’t bear to sit here and watch this happen to Jane because of his own stupid mistake.

English lifted his arm so that the built-in revolver cocked; the cylinder rotated with a series of horrifying clicks, and he held himself there for a moment. Jane didn’t dare to move, nor did she cry, but her eyes flicked repeatedly to the side, where the brass mechanism of her death waited, humming, in the still, electric air.

Fuck.

“Let her wasted life serve as a lesson –”

The alchemical bullets whipped out of John’s revolver at unfailing speed, and struck the pulpit, which caused it to explode on impact and send a shower of caustic neon flame in all directions. English shrieked as flaming naphthenic acid rained on him, and he shot, another thunderclap sound, but he missed Jane by a mile and the bullet ricocheted – John barrelled over the Lamplighters around him and sprinted through the spooked, writhing, screaming crowd to _Jane_ , who, still alive and terrified, grabbed his wrist, and the pair of them leaped through the huge circular window, right through the glass that shattered on the impact of John’s shoulder, and they dropped heavily into the undergrowth below. And they ran.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I changed characters who were originally OCs to characters from canon. Lord English is John's boss, Calliope was the previous mayor, and the role of Ed is now filled by Jane, who John has not killed.


	25. All My Friends, I Apologise

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> It's all over now.
> 
>  **Trigger warning:** Torture

They had bought themselves a few minutes from the commotion John had caused in the mayoral mansion; John landed with a thump in a bundle of thorns, scratching his face, but he bounded to his feet immediately and helped Jane up – mercifully she was not badly hurt, but the tumble out of the window had knocked the wind out of her. They didn’t have time to wait, and Jane rose to the occasion, jerking upright with him. They had no words to say to each other for now. John couldn’t construct an explanation or an apology for this sorry situation, not with their imminent capture and execution screaming in his mind’s eye, so they took off at speed, John gripping Jane’s hand like it was a lifesaver. John threw a backward glance to see the plume of smoke beginning to rise from the shattered windows, and a sick, sorry feeling began to rise in his throat like vomit. 

John’s lungs blazed like they were full of gasoline and his heart jumped like an over-wound clockwork toy. He and Jane kept a white-knuckled grip on each other’s hands as they tore a desperate path at full speed through the back alleys of the Athenaeum, their boots splashing in puddles and crunching on so much shattered glass, grinding it into powder; John smashed each lamp that they passed by whipping it furiously with the barrel of his gun and seared the shit out of his hands on white hot flame for his efforts. This plunged the path behind them into darkness, and left their assailants confused, delayed – temporarily. In the near distance, John could hear the uproar on the main streets, the angry tramping of rank and file footsteps, the gunshots cracking out in earnest, the bewildered screaming of civilians caught unawares.

The two of them took a corner as tight as a skinny, pointed elbow, and hunkered down in the shadow of a dumpster, which further dimmed as John lay waste to the solitary sputtering lamp. They breathed heavily, raggedly; in the last traces of light, John could see to wipe a little of the blood daubed on Jane’s face, soft and gentle. She grabbed his hand and kissed his blistered fingers.

“There’s a grate over there,” John whispered to her in a voice just a hair’s breadth over silent, hoarse with the effort of their escape, shaking with the great heaves of his diaphragm and the alarmed staggering of his heart. “It leads to the tunnels. You can get away.”

“What are you going to do?” Jane hissed back.

“I’ll throw them off, they won’t know where you went,” John whispered. Her face turned and her lip curled, but John shook his head. “I won’t let you die for my stupid mistake. No way.”

“John,” Jane said, and then she listened, hard. The Lamplighters were a couple of streets away now, closing in. John’s heart rocketed. Jane grabbed either side of his face with her cold, damp hands. “I hope you and your friends make it out of this alive.”

John gawked at her. Friends? Jane knew perfectly well he didn’t have friends – how could she know about Karkat and the others?

“I wish I could stay. I wish I could protect you,” Jane said, a couple of tears tipping down her face. She stroked John’s cheek with her thumb. “I wish I could tell you everything, but we’re out of time.”

Then she stood, kissed the top of his head, and slinked away, dragging the grate cover away so that she could slip through the narrow aperture, and the last John saw of her were her shockingly white fingers, streaked with blood, as she lowered herself down into the underbelly of the city. John repositioned the grate cover and took off again, no time to mourn, no time to wonder about anything besides the vanishing chance he had to outrun the rest of the Lamplighters, and Lord English, the most powerful man in the city.

John was torn. The underground tunnels were hardly secret anymore, so without John to buy time as a distraction, Jane would surely be caught again. But also, he felt an urgent need to return to the Lower City, to find Karkat and Eridan, and the others, to warn them of what was coming – but now enemies swarmed all around him, the traitor, and every alley exit was a gamble. John prayed silently for Jaspers, but that fucking cat seemed to serve everybody else, and never him. Oh, god, he felt so alone, and so afraid, and so unprepared for the consequences of all his actions to fall into his hands like this. John took a tighter grip on his pistol, set his face in a scowl to keep from crying, and steeled himself for the oncoming onslaught.

* * *

They had chased him all the way to the square in the very centre of the Athenaeum, but it had been a difficult and winding path for them, John made sure of it. The other Lamplighters weren’t familiar with those side passages and alleys that fell off the main patrol routes, but John’s longstanding involvement with the Striders meant that these streets were a connate part of him by now, a convoluted and snarled network that shadowed all of his nerves and his blood vessels. John breathed these streets, and now, remembering those nocturnal reconnaissance missions he had been on with Karkat gave him strength, when they once picked their way through the streets at night and examined each other closely in the dim light; that evening centuries ago in the city library, poring over clandestine, taboo texts, and laughing with each other – their budding love, the beginning of something that was about to die like a cockroach slammed under a book.

No. They would never die.

All around him, the diamond-shaped lawn was ebullient with alchemical flame, hot and bright and horrifying, so hot that John felt it could transmute matter. The willow trees had already succumbed, each crumpling into blackened skeletons that sublimated even as he looked, pouring rolling plumes of smoke. The Lamplighters had him cornered; he was knee-deep in the fountain, his back pressed against the legs of the jade lady statue, who unshakeably held aloft her pitcher, and poured down the sweet, cool water that guarded him from the blistering heat of the blaze.

The others were too afraid to come close, now, because the flames seared so so hot; they crowded and clustered at the edges of the square, bellowing for his blood, for the traitor’s head. John had a chance to catch his breath and to think, but there was little else to be done. He pushed himself back against the statue; he couldn’t feel the cool jade stone through his wool jacket, but he could feel that she was there, and though she did not move or speak, he felt that she would have looked upon this sorry scene and wept if she could.

Lord English had materialised, John could see. He cut through the crowds, who fell silent and parted for him to cross. And he stepped into the flames, his feet crunching on the grass that had been torched to glassy grit, and he laughed a bitter laugh, as it did not hurt him.

“What have you done. You stupid boy,” he boomed, and John could neither falter nor make himself smaller, because he was already shaking, and already shrinking away. “Where is the girl.”

John swallowed. “I don’t know,” he said back, and Lord English frowned.

“You absconded. With her. All of us,” English said, and made a sweeping gesture around to his audience, “Watched you as you went.”

John just shook his head. Anybody smarter than him – Vriska, Rose – would know the way out of here. But it was so hot, and he was so afraid. Lord English was drawing ever closer, flexing his brass arm, his eyes unblinkingly fixed on John like a hungry animal.

“We split up,” John said. “I don’t know where she went.”

English had stepped into the fountain. John pressed himself back, hard, praying that the lady would suddenly animate and reach down to protect him, but no such a thing happened, and instead, English gripped John by the neck with his impossibly, unbearably strong brass arm, the fingers of which had become white-hot in the flames and sizzled against John’s skin on contact – John would have yelled, but he could not, and he flailed desperately as English lifted him from the water, and pinned him against the statue several feet in the air, his legs kicking, gripping the metal arm by its wrist, uselessly, with his fingers that fried and flayed with the heat.

“Was it worth it. To protect her?” English said, and John could not reply. English laughed, horribly.

Of course it had been worth it. All of this – all of the blood and the pain, all of the gunshot wounds and the sleepless nights, the fights, the subterfuge, the fear, he would give it all again, and more, to know that he was the tragic hero in the end, that he had done his best, and for just one last night with Karkat, one last chance to say that he loved him, a chance for a real goodbye. John battled as his vision began to blacken at the edges, and his brain screamed for sweet, fresh oxygen. He fought to keep Karkat and Jane and all the others in his mind’s eye. For a second it was bliss, and then English headbutted him in the face with a sick crack, and dropped his wasted body in the water – obviously under the impression that John had passed out.

But no. These months and months of suffering and misery had made John Egbert a tough nut to crack. John was back on his feet snappier than a lightning bolt, spitting out the blood that dripped from his nose into his mouth with pure hot rage, and, no longer content to sit back and feel sorry for himself, he cocked his pistol and fired a shot, in cold blood, at point-blank range, that missed English’s head and burrowed into the sensitive and raw part where his brass arm met his fresh amputation wound. English howled and fell backwards over the edge of the fountain, clutching his shoulder that grew dark and wet.

And then John turned, and absconded into the flames, protected by virtue of being soaked to the bone, and forced his way through the throng of Lamplighters who had mostly rushed forward to extinguish the square and help their glorious leader. And John felt like a god.

* * *

They caught him in the end, obviously. But they had to drag him, howling like a wild animal, from the border of the city back to the Barracks. Nobody had been able to knock him out or subdue him, and whenever they had thought he was out for the count, John had sprung back again, urgent and vital, desperate to keep their attention fixed on him. Now, in his cell, stripped of his weapons and of his Lamplighter jacket, and locked in there all alone, John took stock of his injuries, which, all things considered, were not terrible. His nose was mashed and tender, but that didn’t matter. The pads of his hands were all purple where they had been seared on English’s arm; his neck was likely the same. Mostly, mercifully, he was untouched from the flames.

Where was Jane now? John hoped against hope that she had escaped deep into the bowels of the tunnel system and shied away from the light. And he prayed that someone in the Lower City had noticed the commotion he had caused, and raised the alarm, and that they were at least prepared for the storm that was coming their way. There was no window in his cell, he did not know the Lamplighters’ movements, and he was stuck here. When he slammed his fists against the door, no one answered.

John threw himself down in the corner of the empty room, and waited.

After some time, the door opened, and a couple of Lamplighters that John didn’t know walked in. And John got hurt.

At first, they didn’t leave so much as a scratch on him. John was hooded and someone held a gun to his head, and John screamed, and cried, and begged them to let him live, but when they pulled the trigger, the gun had been empty all along. John was gagged with heavy hands held over his mouth until his brain went foggy, and then they let him breathe, but only for a minute, and then the whole horrible process began again. Sharp iron implements were heated in the brazier until they glowed red hot, and they were waved close to John’s face, and when John flinched away, they laughed at him.

Still, he told them nothing. The things that they thought they knew were wrong, and it made John laugh, which incensed them further, until one of them slapped him around the face, which dissolved the unspoken rule against physical violence, and from then it became unspeakably worse. But it was okay, because all pain is temporary. All pain is temporary. All pain is t

They eventually left John in a crumpled heap in the middle of the room, thinking him dead. But John had not lost much blood, he would live, and they had learned nothing from him. And they hadn’t locked the cell door.

One last dash, on one last, blood-soaked hope, that he could make it to Karkat in time. John somehow dragged himself to his feet, where he wavered and swayed dangerously. They had taken his glasses and smashed them, so he could hardly see, and he was unarmed. It didn’t matter. John threw open the cell door with his last vestiges of strength, took a deep breath in, and bolted. The commotion was near-instant – two guards spotted him and took off after him down the corridor, but John had the advantage of bloody-minded determination, and he no longer feared punishment.

He leaped down a steep spiral staircase, which echoed all around him with the sound of guards tramping down after him. Once John was safely on the street, he was immediately accosted by two Lamplighters, who were distracted in a second by crack shots aimed at their knees – they both dropped with a terrible yowl – John didn’t know who held the smoking gun, and he didn’t care. He ran with such desperate speed that he had to double back as he’d missed the grating that led to the tunnel system – John threw it open with a furious howl of strength, and ducked down into it, and disappeared out of the fray altogether.

After a few minutes, he had secreted himself away in a clandestine area of the tunnels, where the only sound was the intermittent trickling ooze of the tunnel walls, and there was no indication of the conflagration in the city. There was time for him to catch his breath but only for a few minutes.

Was this how he was going to go out? A hero who turned up too late to make a difference? He should have known all along, he realised, that they were doomed. Even if he went to Karkat now, their only remaining option would be to hide out until the Lamplighters came, and then they would take Karkat or kill him, and they would certainly kill John after his actions this evening. John weighed this in his mind: if the last hours of his life were spent with Karkat, that wouldn’t be so bad. At the very least he could die a just and heroic death knowing that he had tried as hard as he could to keep his friends alive, in a world where the dice were loaded against them from the start.

* * *

The Lamplighters had already passed through the part of the Lower City that John emerged onto; they had obviously decided to mount their attack early as retribution for his actions, or out of their fanatical lust for violence. By now, in fact, it was oddly peaceful – the only sound was the crackling and creaking of buildings that were burning and ransacked. The bodies were all still; none of them were wailing or begging for mercy. And there were no survivors here – John did not know where they had been taken, but it was near-silent. He picked his way through the wreckage, his heart hurting for each new body in his path, each time praying that it was not someone that he knew. All of the lanterns were smashed and there was glass everywhere, and the air was so heavy with soot and ash that it was difficult to see, and the only light was that cast by the flames as they lapped hungrily at what skeletal remains still stood, and yet when John saw Nepeta and Equius lying side by side, face down, in the dirt, there was no mistaking them. They had died in defence of one another because John had been too slow and come too late to warn them.

He felt sick. Not ten paces later, Terezi too had been wasted by a gunshot wound to her chest. John kneeled beside her and touched his fingers to her arm. She was not still warm. All of this had happened while he was locked in his cell. If only he had tried harder, if only he had run faster…

John pressed on, because what else was there to do? He slipped through the back alleys and the side streets in the familiar direction of Eridan’s house, but as he walked he detected no signs of life, and he began to feel panic creeping on. If Karkat was already gone, or already dead – John couldn’t follow that line of thought to its conclusion. 

The streets that had once seemed like a second home to him were now threatening and alien in their emptiness; John continually expected an enemy to leap out from some shadow somewhere, but he could see the Lamplighters’ movements from how they razed every building that they sacked with flames – John could easily see the dim orange glow and columns of rising smoke in the near distance, and he knew that it would not be long before they came here, too. He had to make it to Karkat in time to warn him, but by now there was nowhere to run. Even if they hid out they could last for a couple of weeks, maybe, but with no food and no water and no safe place to stay, they would eventually have to submit. All the paths John traced in his mind led to disaster. The last he could do was to stick with Karkat until the end, just to let him know that their love was not going to die until it died with them both.

Shortly, he reached Eridan’s house. Every window was dark and the curtains were drawn. John crept up to the front door. It was not locked, so he pushed it open, to find that it was dark inside, and very still, and very quiet. His heart was in his throat by now, pulsating, and he had no weapons to keep a hand on, so he gently clicked the door shut behind him, and pressed on through the hall, listening close, squinting through the darkness and praying he wouldn’t spot any more bodies. He gently pushed open the door to the living room, which creaked ever so slightly, and then he heard the tiniest noise, more a movement of air than anything. He trained his eyes on the room, and could see the familiar outlines of furniture, and the fireplace where… it felt like they had been gathered around it not even an hour ago, all laughing, believing that they would make it out of this.

“Hello?” John murmured, barely louder than mouthing.

“John?” Karkat croaked back, and John saw a shadowy figure creep out from behind a sofa, and cross the room to stand before him, in a pane of dim light cast by the window that caught every angle and curve of his flushed, worried face. He was so painfully beautiful that it made John’s chest ache with wanting. Karkat’s moon-yellow eyes were wide, taking a long, long look at John, taking in all of him, committing him to memory like it was the last time. And John did the same, taking stock of all the things that made Karkat so perfect – his tiny horns, little soft points, his downy hair, his sharp teeth, the hollows of his cheeks carved out by hunger, the pale red edging to his big eyes, the sweater that was a size too big, the jeans that were too long so he had to roll them up, every single thing about him.

“They hurt you,” Karkat croaked, and John felt self-conscious of every wound. “What’s happening?”

“It doesn’t hurt,” John said back, and cupped Karkat’s face with his hand. “They’re coming. The Lamplighters, and English. I’m sorry.”

“Did you betray us?” Karkat whispered, his neon gas lamp eyes fixed wide open, and John shook his head forcefully.

“English was going to kill Jane, but I couldn’t let him,” John said, and Karkat’s lip wobbled. John could scarcely believe that all of his efforts had come down to one stupid mistake, and Jane’s life. “We ran. I made sure she got away. I tried to distract them for as long as I could… they tortured me for hours.”

Karkat was very quiet, staring at John with the biggest, wettest eyes.

“What did they do to you?” Karkat said, whimpering.

“They wanted to know your names,” John said, and then he shook his head. “I did not tell them anything. They thought I was dead when they were done with me. That’s how I got away.”

“You’re so brave. You’re amazing,” Karkat said, and then kissed his face, his cut up cheeks, his clipped chin, his burned neck.

“I wanted to protect you,” John whispered into Karkat’s ear. “I wish I could.”

“We were fucked from the start, weren’t we?” was all that Karkat could say, and then hung his head.

There was nothing that John could say to make this better, and all he could do was stare at Karkat.

“Where are the others?” John said, suddenly remembering the conspicuous silence in the house, and his heart flipped with worry, again.

“They already left,” Karkat said, and then looked up, urgent. “We didn’t know what was happening. I told them I had to stay here in case you came back. I had to say goodbye to you, I can’t – I can’t deal with this, John, please, what are they going to do to us? Are they going to kill me? I don’t want to die, I just want to stay with you, can’t we leave? Can we get out of here? Fuck, John, please, make this okay, please.”

Karkat cried openly, fat tears rolling down his cheek, his chest quivering with little sobs, and all John could do was look at him, difficult without his glasses and through a haze of tears.

“They are taking trolls alive,” John said, “If you co-operate… I’m sorry, Karkat, I don’t know.”

John could hardly believe that their time was up. It was too much. He wanted to turn back the clock, force things to go back to the way they were before – tenuous, but at least they had some chance of a future, some scrap of hope that things might get better one day, and at the end of it all they would be able to lie down next to each other without the weight of the world pressing on them, and nobody would question or scorn them, they could take their time and get to learn each other in a way that was less urgent and less desperate – that John would maybe finally understand how matesprits and moirails were supposed to love each other. Oh, how he loved Karkat. The things their love had done, the insurmountable things they’d defeated together, all of their dreams and their promises. John couldn’t cope. Whenever he was near Karkat he felt brave – before they met he had always felt so small and unimportant, and he had no idea how powerful love could be, what it could bring out of him, the unimaginable heights that he could rise to… if fate had dragged them together then it was too soon, too soon to split them apart.

“John, you have to live,” Karkat said.

“How can I?” John croaked, and his eyes stung. “Without –”

Karkat suddenly lashed out and grabbed him, firm but tender, by the shoulders. “No, you _have_ to. You were our hope. You changed everything for me, and I love you, and I swear I will never ever stop, not until they finally fucking kill me.”

“I’m so sorry,” John whispered, his voice cracking. “I love you. I love you.”

For several hours, they stayed hunkered down in the dark, behind the sofa in Eridan’s living room. Their time really was up, but John could almost believe, if he tried, that they could stay here, like this, forever. It felt like they were the last people alive, and nobody could hurt them – nobody would find them. Karkat was so warm between his arms, pressed against his chest, and for once John felt not that he was little and needed protection, but that he was so strong, brave, and angry, ready to face the enemy one last time with gritted teeth, unarmed but unafraid. Karkat kissed John on every part of him that had been hurt that he could reach – his burnt neck, his roasted palms, his stung cheeks, his cracked forehead, his smashed nose, and the older wounds, too, the scar-packed bullet wound in his abdomen, and all the fresh contusions and lacerations that John could no longer remember where they had come from. John promised Karkat that he would come back for him one day, that he would find him, that he would orchestrate some grand scheme to save them all; they both sobbed, shattered by the thought of what their life would have been like in better times. It could have been great. As the Lamplighters drew closer they could see them out the window – the menacing crackle of flame, the bright searing light, the sound of boots trampling, and the screams, and the gunshots. Karkat curled closer into him, and John held him, and carried on holding him until the door was blown off its hinges and somebody grabbed him and wrenched his arms behind his back, and pried him away.

The last John saw of Karkat was his matesprit lying on the floor, pinned down with his arms behind his back by one Lamplighter as another forced a hood over his screaming head, his frothing, biting mouth. John fought the hands trying to drag him away, wild with an animal urge to protect his love, and he kept howling to Karkat how he loved him, how he always would, and then he felt two or three strikes to the back of his head with a bar, and then all was very very dark, and very very still.

* * *

When John finally woke up, he found himself lying on his front, his bloody cheek pressed against the stone floor of a prison cell, again. The silence nearly overwhelmed him – he could hear the dull thump of blood in his ears, and he resented his heart for keeping him alive. His head felt heavy, and – he interrogated with his fingers – the back of it was hot and tacky with his own blood. He remembered the sick thwack of a crowbar, and was mutely surprised that he had been brought back as a prisoner, alive, rather than shot dead for his treachery. Where were the others, now? What had they done to Karkat – had they subdued him? How? Had they shot him, or was he locked away somewhere, too? John had finally dared to stand up to act by himself, but it had been too late, and they had all paid the price for his fundamental lack of judgement or foresight.

He managed to push himself to his feet, lurching this way and that, his head reeling, fresh blood trickling from a few wounds. Then he thumped his fists furiously against the door of his cell, rattling the metal in its frame with a loud clang, the vibration reverberating into his very bones.

“English? Are you out there?” he demanded. “Let me go!”

Silence followed.

“Hello?” John insisted, and then took a couple of steps back, and booted his cell door as hard as he possibly could. “Anybody?!”

“Stop,” came English’s cold, curt voice, and in another life John would have softened and stepped back, but not this time. He jutted his chin angrily in the direction of the slat in the door, where English’s eyes suddenly appeared, squinting at him.

“What did you do? Did you kill them?!” John barked at him, slamming his fists against the door again. English did not flinch.

“My sister’s way of doing things. Is now over,” English said, disquietingly calm. “We have captured. The opposition. And killed those. Who refused to co-operate.”

John thought of Nepeta and Equius, lying dead side by side, and poor Terezi, and he snarled like an animal. The others were alive as promised, but John was powerless to help them in here.

“Consider yourself lucky. Egbert. I gave special orders. That you be returned alive. Other dissenters. Did not receive the same mercy,” English said. “But you. It will bring me more pleasure. To subjugate you. Than it would to kill you.”

“How long are you going to keep me in here?” John spat.

The corners of English’s eyes creased with pleasure.

“Until you see. That all along. Your actions were futile,” English said, and his eyes widened, horrifyingly wide, the whites popping, and he laughed. “And you. John Egbert. Were a fool.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you so, so much for reading Lamplit. This story has been with me for four years and I honestly feel so grateful that you all were interested in seeing it out to the end. All of your kind words have carried me through some really difficult times. My life is very different now, which is great!
> 
> But I'm not out of stories to tell. On New Year's Eve, just about four years after I posted the first chapter of Lamplit, I am going to post the first chapter of its sequel. Subscribe / bookmark / whatever you like if you're interested, and check back on December 31st for Nightlight, where we will all suffer under English's horrifying new regime.


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